Pregnant by a regal rogue…

The Princes’ Brides

Three passionate, intense romances from a classic Mills & Boon author!

The Princes’Brides
Sandra Marton
The Greek Prince’s Chosen Wife

By

Sandra Marton
The Spanish Prince’s Virgin Bride

By

Sandra Marton

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

Before you start reading, why not sign up?

Thank you for downloading this Mills & Boon book. If you want to hear about exclusive discounts, special offers and competitions, sign up to our email newsletter today!

SIGN ME UP!

Or simply visit

signup.millsandboon.co.uk

Mills & Boon emails are completely free to receive and you can unsubscribe at any time via the link in any email we send you.

In July 2010 Mills & Boon bring you four classic collections, each featuring three favourite romances by our bestselling authors

THE PRINCES’ BRIDES

by Sandra Marton

The Italian Prince’s Pregnant Bride

The Greek Prince’s Chosen Wife

The Spanish Prince’s Virgin Bride

TYCOON’S CHOICE

Kept by the Tycoon by Lee Wilkinson

Taken by the Tycoon by Kathryn Ross

The Tycoon’s Proposal by Leigh Michaels

THE MILLIONAIRE’S CLUB:

JACOB, LOGAN & MARC

Black-Tie Seduction by Cindy Gerard

Less-Than-Innocent Invitation by Shirley Rogers

Strictly Confidential Attraction by Brenda Jackson

SAYING ‘YES!’ TO THE BOSS

Having Her Boss’s Baby by Susan Mallery

Business or Pleasure? by Julie Hogan

Business Affairs by Shirley Rogers

SANDRA MARTON wrote her first novel while she was still in primary school. Her doting parents told her she’d be a writer some day and Sandra believed them. In secondary school and college she wrote dark poetry nobody but her boyfriend understood – though, looking back, she suspects he was just being kind. As a wife and mother she wrote murky short stories in what little spare time she could manage, but not even her boyfriend-turned-husband could pretend to understand those. Sandra tried her hand at other things, among them teaching and serving on the Board of Education in her home town, but the dream of becoming a writer was always in her heart.

At last Sandra realised she wanted to write books about what all women hope to find: love with that one special man, love that’s rich with fire and passion, love that lasts for ever. She wrote a novel, her very first, and sold it to Mills & Boon® Modern™ romance. Since then she’s written more than sixty books, all of them featuring sexy, gorgeous, larger-than-life heroes. A four-time RITA® award finalist, she’s also received five Romantic Times magazine awards and has been honoured with RT’s Career Achievement Award for Series Romance. Sandra lives with her very own sexy, gorgeous, larger-than-life hero in a sun-filled house on a quiet country lane in the north-eastern United States.

Don’t miss Sandra Marton’s exciting new novel, Falco: The Dark Guardian, available in August 2010 from Mills & Boon® Modern™.

The Italian Prince’s Pregnant Bride

By

Sandra Marton

Chapter One

SHE came hurrying along the sidewalk, enveloped from head to toe in black suede, stiletto-heeled boots clicking sharply, her head bent against the rain-driven wind, and barreled into Nicolo just as he stepped from the taxi.

The doorman moved forward but Nicolo had already dropped his briefcase and caught her by the shoulders.

“Easy,” he said pleasantly.

Her hood fell back as she looked up at him. Nicolo, always appreciative of beauty, smiled.

She was beautiful, with elegant bones, a mouth that looked soft and inviting, and eyes the deep blue of spring violets, all that framed by a mass of honey-colored loose curls.

If someone had to run you down, this was surely the woman an intelligent man would choose.

“Are you all right?”

She pulled out of his grasp. “I’m fine.”

“My fault entirely,” he said graciously. “I should have watched where I was—”

“Yes,” the woman said, “you should have.”

He blinked. She was looking at him with total disdain. His smile faded. Though he was Roman, he’d spent a good part of his life in Manhattan. He understood that civility was not an art here but it was she who’d run into him.

“I beg your pardon, signorina, but—”

“But then,” she said coldly, “I suppose people like you think you own the street.”

Nicolo lifted his hands from her shoulders with exaggerated care.

“Look, I don’t know what your problem is, but—”

“You,” she said crisply, “are my problem.”

What was this? A Mona Lisa with the temperament of a hellcat. Innate old-world gallantry warred with new-world attitude.

Attitude won.

“You know,” he said brusquely, “I apologized to you when there was no need, and you speak to me as if I were scum. You could use some manners.”

“Just because I’m a woman—”

“Is that what you are?” His smile was as cold as his words. “Let’s see about that, shall we?” Temper soaring, logic shot to hell, Nicolo pulled the blonde to her toes and kissed her.

It lasted less than a second. Just a quick brush of his mouth over hers. Then he let go of her, had the satisfaction of seeing those violet eyes widen in astonishment…

And caught the rich, sweet taste of her on his lips.

Sweet heaven. Had he gone un po ’pazzo?

He had to be. Only a crazy man would haul a mean-tempered woman into his arms on Fifth Avenue.

“You,” she said, “you—you—”

Oh, but it had been worth it. Look at her now, sputtering like a steam engine, that icy demeanor completely shattered.

She jerked free of his hands. Her arm rose. She was going to slap him; he could read it in those amazing eyes, eyes that flashed lethal bolts of lightning. He probably deserved it—but he’d be damned if he’d let her do it.

He bent his head toward hers. “Hit me,” he said softly, “and I promise, I’ll make your world come crashing down around your ears.”

Her lips formed a phrase he would not have imagined women knew. Not the women in his world, at any rate, but then none of them would have accused a man of something clearly their fault.

Why be modest? The truth was, not a woman he’d ever met would have blamed him even if he were at fault.

The hellcat glared at him. He returned the look. Then she swept past him, honey-blond mane glittering with raindrops, black suede coat billowing after her like a sail.

He watched her go until she was lost in the umbrella-shrouded crowd hurrying through the chilly March rain.

Then he took a deep breath and turned his back to her.

His eyes met the doorman’s. Nothing. Not the slightest acknowledgment that anything the least bit unusual had happened but then, this was New York. New Yorkers had long ago learned it was wisest not to know anything.

And a damned good thing for him.

Kissing her had been bad enough. Challenging her to call the police…

Nicolo shuddered.

How stupid could a man be? He could have ended up with his face spread across Page Six. Not exactly the publicity one wanted before a meeting with the ninety-year-old head of an investment firm that prided itself on decorum and confidentiality.

The rain was coming down harder.

The doorman already had his suitcase. Nicolo picked up his briefcase and walked into the hotel.

His suite was on the forty-third floor, which gave him an excellent view of the park and the skyline beyond it.

When he started looking for a permanent place to live in the city, he’d want a view like this.

Nicolo tossed his raincoat on a chair. If all went well, he’d contact a Realtor after Monday’s meeting.

If? There was no “if” about it. The word wasn’t in his lexicon. He never went after something without making damned sure he knew when, where and how to get it. That approach was a key to his success.

He toed off his shoes, stripped away his clothes and headed for the shower.

He was fully prepared for Monday’s meeting and his long-anticipated buyout of Stafford-Coleridge-Black.

His financial empire was huge, with offices in London, Paris, Singapore, and, of course, Rome.

It was time for Barbieri International to move into the New York market. For that, he wanted something that would be the crown jewel of his corporation.

In the rarefied echelon of private banking, that could only be Stafford-Coleridge-Black, whose client list read like a Who’s Who of American wealth and power.

Only one thing stood in the way: SCB’s chairman, James Black.

“I have no idea what you’d think to discuss with me,” the old man had said when he’d finally agreed to take Nicolo’s phone call.

“I’ve heard rumors,” Nicolo had answered carefully, “that you are considering a change.”

“You mean,” Black had said bluntly, “you’ve heard that I’m going to die soon. Well, I assure you, sir, I am not.”

“What I have heard,” Nicolo had said, “is that a man of your good judgment believes in planning ahead.”

Black had made a sound that might have been a laugh.

“Touché, Signore Barbieri. But I assure you, any changes I might make would be of no interest to you. We are family owned and have been for more than two hundred years. The bank has been passed from one generation to another.” A brief, barely perceptible pause. “But I wouldn’t expect you to understand the importance of that.”

Nicolo had thought how good it was that they were not face-to-face. Even so, he had to work hard to control his temper. Black was an old man but he was in full command of his faculties. What he’d said had to be a deliberate, if thinly veiled, insult.

This high up the ladder, the international financial community was like an exclusive club. People knew things about each other and what Black knew was that Nicolo’s wealth and stature, despite his title, had not come from legacy and inheritance but had been solely self-created.

As far as the James Blacks of this world were concerned, that was not a desirable image.

Probably not desirable as far as Fifth Avenue honey-blondes were concerned, either, Nicolo mused, and wondered where in hell that thought had come from?

What mattered, all that mattered this weekend, was his business with Black. It had mattered enough during that phone call to keep his tone neutral when he responded to the flinty old bastard’s gibe.

“On the contrary,” Nicolo had said. “I do understand. Completely. I believe in maintaining tradition.” He’d paused, weighing each word. “I also believe you would do your institution a disservice if you refuse to hear what I have to say.”

He’d gambled that Black would bite. Not that it was all that much of a gamble, considering what Nicolo knew.

SCB had, indeed, always been family-owned and operated. The problem was that the old man was facing his ninetieth birthday and his sole heir was a grandchild still in school.

Still in school…and a girl.

Nicolo was sure that “tradition,” to James Black, meant handing the reins of the company to an heir, not an heiress. Black had never made a secret of his feelings about women in business.

And that was probably the one thing the two men could agree on, Nicolo mused as he stepped from the shower. It was what he would build his argument on, Monday morning.

Women were too emotional. They were unpredictable and undisciplined. They did well as assistants, even, on occasion, as heads of departments, but as ultimate decisionmakers?

Not until science figured out a way women could overcome the dizzying up-and-down ride of their hormones.

It wasn’t their fault—it was simply a fact of life.

And that, Nicolo thought as he dressed in gray flannel trousers, a black cashmere turtleneck and mocs, was his ace in the hole.

Nicolo was the only investor who could afford the indulgence of buying SCB privately. That meant that Black had nowhere to turn except to him, unless he wanted to sell his venerable institution to one of the giant conglomerates hungering for it, then live long enough to see it disappear within the corporate maw.

He was the old man’s salvation and they both knew it. The moment of truth had come last week when Black’s secretary phoned and said her employer would agree to a brief meeting solely as a courtesy.

“Of course,” Nicolo had said calmly but when he hung up, he’d pumped his fist in victory.

The meeting meant only one thing: the old man had admitted defeat and would sell to him. Oh, he’d undoubtedly make him dance through a couple of hoops first, but how bad could that be?

Nicolo slipped on a leather bomber jacket and shut the door to his suite behind him.

He wouldn’t dance, but he’d move his feet in time to the music. Do just enough to placate the old bastard.

Then Stafford-Coleridge-Black would be his.

Not bad for a boy who’d grown up in not-so-genteel poverty, Nicolo thought, and pressed the button for the elevator.

The rain had stopped, though the skies were gray and soggy.

The doorman flagged a cab.

“Sixty-third off Lexington,” Nicolo told the driver.

He was meeting friends at the Eastside Club. The three of them had agreed, via e-mail yesterday, on the benefits of a quick workout, especially since both Nicolo and Damian had just flown in.

Private planes or not, a man felt his muscles tighten after a seemingly interminable international flight.

Then they’d go somewhere quiet for dinner and catch up on old times. He was looking forward to that. He, Damian and Lucas had known each other forever. For thirteen years, ever since they’d met at a pub just off the Yale campus, three eighteen-year-old kids from three different parts of the world, all of them wondering how in hell they’d survive in this strange country.

Survive? They’d flourished. And formed a tight friendship. They saw each other less frequently now, thanks to their individual business interests, but they were still best pals.

And still single, which was exactly how they all wanted it. In fact, they always began the evening with the same toast.

“Life,” Lucas would say solemnly, “is short.”

“And marriage,” Damian would add even more solemnly, “is forever.”

The last part of the toast was left to Nicolo.

“And freedom,” he’d say dramatically, “freedom, gentlemen, is everything!”

He was smiling as his cab pulled up in front of the Eastside Club. It was housed in what had once been a block of nineteenth-century brownstones that had been gutted, completely made over and combined into one structure.

A very exclusive health club.

The Eastside didn’t advertise. No plaque or sign identified it to passersby. Membership was by invitation only, reserved for those who valued privacy and could afford the steep fees that guaranteed it.

For all that, the club was completely lacking in pretension. There were no trendy exercise gadgets, no bouncy music, and the only part of the gym with a mirrored wall was the free-weight area so that you could check your reflection to see if you were lifting properly.

What there were, in addition to the weights, were punching bags, a pool and a banked indoor track.

Best of all, the Eastside was for men only.

Women were a distraction. Besides, Nicolo thought as he inserted his key card in the front door lock, it was a relief to get away from them for a while.

He had enough women to deal with in his life. Too many, he sometimes thought, when ending a relationship led to tears. He was, he’d heard whispered, “an excellent catch.” He scoffed at that but to himself, he admitted it was probably true.

Why not be honest?

“Good evening, Mr. Barbieri. Nice to see you again, sir.”

“Jack,” Nicolo said amiably. He signed in and headed for the locker room.

He had money. A private jet. Cars. He owned a ski lodge in Aspen, an oceanfront estate on Mustique, a pied-a-terre in Paris and, of course, there was the palazzo in Rome, the one that had supposedly come to the Barbieri family through Julius Caesar.

That was what his great-grandmother had always claimed.

Nicolo thought it more likely it had come to them through a thief in Caesar’s time, but he’d never contradicted her. He’d loved the old woman as he’d never loved anyone else. He’d always been grateful he’d made his first million and restored the ancient but decrepit Palazzo di Barbieri before she’d died.

Her pleasure had brought joy to his heart.

He’d liked making her happy. In fact, he liked making most women happy.

It was only when their demands became unreasonable, when they began to talk of The Future, of The Importance of Settling Down—and he could almost actually feel the physical weight they put into the phrase when it tumbled from their lips—that Nicolo knew that Making Them Happy wasn’t as important as Not Making a Commitment.

No way. Not him. Not yet.

For an evening? Of course. A week? Yes. Even a month. Two months. Hell, he wasn’t the kind of man to jump from bed to bed…

What would the woman in the black suede coat be like in bed? A honey-maned tigress? Or an ice queen?

Not that he gave a damn. It was simply a matter of intellectual curiosity.

He liked women who enjoyed their femininity. Enjoyed being appreciated by a man.

Nicolo hung his things in his locker.

It didn’t take a psychiatrist to figure out that the tigress was not such a woman. Although, in the bed of the right man, perhaps she could be.

The mane of hair. The delicate oval face. The amazing eyes, that tender mouth. And, yes, he’d felt its tenderness even in that brush of his lips against hers…

Fantastico.

Hell. He was giving himself a hard-on over a woman who’d insulted him, who he would never see again. He didn’t want to think about her or any woman. Not this weekend. No distractions. No sex. Like an athlete, he believed in abstinence before going mano a mano.

He needed to focus on Monday’s meeting.

Nicolo pulled on gray cotton running shorts, a sleeveless, ancient Yale sweatshirt and a pair of Nikes.

A hard, sweaty workout was just what he needed.

The gym was almost empty. Well, it was Saturday night. Only one other guy was in the vast room, pounding around the track with the lonely intensity of the dedicated runner.

Damian.

Nicolo grinned, trotted over and fell in alongside him.

“Any slower,” he said, picking up the pace, “we’d be walking. You getting too old to run fast?”

Damian, who at thirty-one was exactly the same age as Nicolo, shot him a deadpan look.

“I’ll call the paramedics when you collapse.”

“Big talk.”

“A hundred bucks says I can beat you.”

“Twenty times around?”

“Forty,” Nicolo said, and shot away.

Moments later, they finished in a dead heat and turned to each other, breathing hard and grinning from ear to ear.

“How’s Rome?” Damian said.

“How’s Athens?”

The men’s grins widened and they clasped each other in a bear hug. “Man,” Damian said, “you’re a sweaty bastard.”

“You’re not exactly an ad for GQ.”

“How was your flight?”

Nicolo took a couple of towels from a stand beside the track and tossed one to Damian.

“Fine. Some weather just before we landed, but nothing much. Yours?”

“The same,” Damian said, wiping his face. “I really like this little Learjet I bought.”

“Little,” Nicolo said, laughing.

“Well, it’s still not as big as yours.”

“Mine’s always going to be bigger than yours, Aristedes.”

“You wish.”

It was an old line of banter and made them grin again.

“So,” Nicolo said, “where’s Lucas?”

“We’re meeting him in—” Damian looked at his watch. “In two hours.”

“You guys picked a restaurant?”

“Well, more or less.”

Nicolo raised an eyebrow. “Meaning?”

“Meaning,” Damian said, “our old friend bought himself a club. Downtown. The club of the minute, he says.”

“Meaning, crowded. Noisy. Lots of music, lots of booze, lots of spectacular-looking women out for a good time…”

“Sounds terrible,” Damian said solemnly.

Nicolo smiled as he draped his towel around his shoulders. “Yeah, I know. But I have an important meeting Monday morning.”

“Well, so do I.”

“Very important.”

Damian looked at him. “So?”

“So,” Nicolo said, after a moment, “I’m hoping to finalize a deal. With James Black.”

“Whoa. That is important. So, tonight we celebrate in advance, at Lucas’s place.”

“Well, I want to stay focused. Get to bed at a decent hour tonight and tomorrow night. No liquor. No distractions—”

“Thee Mou! Don’t tell me! No sex?”

Nicolo shrugged. “No sex.”

“Sex is not a distraction. It’s exercise. Good for the heart.”

“It’s bad for the concentration.”

“That’s BS.”

“We believed it when we played soccer, remember? And we won.”

“We won,” Damian said dryly, “because the competition was lousy.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I. Giving up sex is against the laws of nature.”

“Idiot,” Nicolo said fondly. The men walked to the free weights area and made their selections. “It’s just a matter of discipline.”

“Unless, of course, there was such an instant attraction you couldn’t walk away.” Damian grunted as he lifted a pair of twenty-pound weights. “And how often is that about to happen?”

“Never,” Nicolo answered—and, unbidden, the image of the blonde with the hot eyes and the cold attitude flashed before his eyes.

He had been reaching for the twenty-pound weights, too. Instead he lifted a pair of heavier ones and worked with them until his mind was a pain-filled blank.

Farther downtown, in a part of Manhattan that was either about to be discovered or still a slum, depending on a buyer’s point of view, Aimee Stafford Coleridge Black slammed her apartment door behind her, tossed her black suede coat at a chair and kicked off her matching boots.

The coat slid off the chair. The boots bounced off the wall. Aimee didn’t give a damn.

Amazing, how a day that began so filled with promise could end so badly.

Aimee marched into the kitchen, filled the kettle with water, put it on to boil and changed her mind. The last thing she needed was a caffeine buzz.

She was buzzing enough without it, thanks to her grandfather.

Why had he summoned her to his office, if not to make the announcement she’d been anticipating?

“I shall retire next May,” he’d told her almost a year ago, “when I reach ninety, at which time I shall place Stafford-Coleridge-Black in the charge of the person who will guide it through its next fifty years. A person who will, of course, carry on the Stafford-Coleridge-Black lineage.”

Lineage. As important to James as breathing but that was fine because she, Aimee, was the only person with both the necessary lineage and the proper education to assume command.

She had a bachelor’s degree in finance. A master’s degree in business. She’d spent her summers since high school interning at SCB.

She knew more about the bank than anyone, maybe even including Grandfather, who still believed in a world devoid of computers and e-mail.

Aimee marched into the bedroom and methodically stripped off the gray wool suit and white silk blouse she’d deemed appropriate for the meeting with Grandfather this afternoon. She’d wanted to look businesslike, even though she knew damned well you could do as much business in jeans as you could in Armani.

She’d even worked up a little speech of assurance about how she wouldn’t change a thing, though she’d mentally crossed her fingers because there were things that definitely needed changing.

She’d presented herself at his office precisely at four. James was a stickler for promptness. She’d kissed his papery cheek, sat down as directed, folded her hands…

And listened as he told her he had not yet reached a decision as to who would replace him.

Be calm, she’d told herself. And she had been, or at least she’d managed to seem calm as she asked him what decision there was to make.

“You already said it would be me, Grandfather.”

“I said it would be someone capable,” James said briskly. “Someone of my lineage.”

“Well—”

The look on his face had frozen her with horror. “You don’t mean…Bradley?”

Bradley. Her cousin. Or her something. Who understood the complexities of second cousins twice removed, or whatever the hell he was? Bradley had been wimping around the bank for years, interning the same as she had, except he’d never done a day’s work, never done anything except try to grope her in the stockroom.

“Not Bradley,” she’d finally breathed.

“Bradley has a degree in economics.”

Yes. From a college that probably also gave degrees in basket-weaving.

“He’s well-spoken.”

He was, once he had three or four straight vodkas in him.

“And,” her grandfather had said, saving the best for last, “he is a man.”

A man. Meaning, nature’s royalty. A prince, whereas she was a lesser creature because she was female.

Grandfather had risen to his feet, indicating that she was no longer welcome in the royal presence.

“Be here Monday morning, Aimee. Ten o’clock sharp. I’ll announce my decision then.”

Dismissed, just like that.

Sent out the door, down the wheezing old elevator, into the street where she’d walked blindly, no idea where in hell she was or where she was going, which was why she hadn’t seen the man and he’d almost knocked her down.

That despicable, horrible man who’d insisted it was she who’d walked into him. Who’d accused her of not being a woman when, damn him, it was the very fact that she was a woman that was going to deny her the one thing she wanted in life.

What a fool she’d been. What an idiot. She’d turned down two wonderful job offers because she’d believed—she’d been stupid enough to believe—

She’d been anguishing over that when the man charged into her.

As if she were invisible, which she undoubtedly was because she was female. Oh, the arrogance of men. Of him. The way he’d clasped her shoulders and looked down at her from the lofty heights of his lofty maleness.

“Easy,” he’d said, and smiled, and that—the smile, the slight foreign huskiness to the word, the broad shoulders, the ink-black hair, the midnight-blue eyes and the face that was the male equivalent of what had launched a thousand ships, that was supposed to make up for his rudeness?

Aimee had told him what she thought of him.

Men didn’t like honesty. She’d learned that a long time ago. And this one, this—this bad-mannered stranger, had decided she needed a lesson, that she needed a graphic reminder of her place in the universe…

He’d kissed her.

Kissed her! Put his mouth on hers, the arrogant, miserable son of a bitch…

His firm mouth. His soft mouth. His mouth that was, any woman could tell, made for long, deep kisses…

God, she was in bad shape. Anger, adrenaline, whatever you called it, was pumping through her veins. She was completely stressed out.

A man would know what to do to ease such stress.

He’d go to a gym and sweat it out. Actually that would work for her, too, but her gym, a gym for women, was closed. Hey, it was Saturday. Date night for the fairer sex, right?

“Such crap,” Aimee said.

She could almost feel the steam coming out of her ears.

Or a man would call up his buddies, meet them someplace crowded and noisy and guzzle beer. That’s what men under pressure did, didn’t they? Go out, drink, talk about stupid things, pick up women?

Sex was the great relaxer. Everybody said so. Okay, not her because she’d had sex and it had been far from memorable but according to everything she’d read, sex could lower your stress levels every time.

Aimee snorted.

Imagine if a woman did that. Called a friend, went someplace loud to drink and looked for a guy to pick up. Went to bed with him, no strings, no ridiculous exchange of names and phone numbers. Just bed.

Just sex.

Of course, some women did. They went looking for sex.

Sex with a stranger. A stranger with dark hair. Blue eyes. A square jaw, straight nose, firm mouth. And that little accent…

The phone rang. Let it. Her voice mail could take the call.

Hi, her recorded voice said briskly. You’ve reached 555-6145. Please leave a message after the tone.

“Aimee, it’s Jen.”

The last person she wanted to talk to! Jen had taken a job with Fox and Curtrain after Aimee pointed her toward it.

“I’m not going to take it,” she’d said, “so why shouldn’t you?”

Why, indeed?

“Aimee, look, I know this isn’t your thing but a new club opened right near me and it’s supposed to draw a hot crowd. And it’s Laura’s birthday, remember her, from the second floor in our dorm? She’s in town and a bunch of us are getting together to, you know, check out the club…” There was giggling in the background and Aimee rolled her eyes. “Okay, Laura’s right. To check out the guys, see if they’re as hunky as everybody says.”

“Jen?” Aimee said, picking up the phone.

“Oh, you’re there! Listen, I don’t know what you’re doing tonight, but—”

“I’m not doing anything. I’ve had—it’s been one of those days, you know?”

“All the more reason to go with us. Have a drink, listen to some hot music—”

“Get picked up by some hot guy,” a female voice in the background said, to another round of giggles.

“That’s the last thing I need,” Aimee said. “I mean, is that all I’m good for? To go to a club where the music’s so loud I won’t be able to think? To let a guy pick me up, buy me a drink—”

“Yeah. I know. It’s a meat market out there—but sometimes, well, sometimes that can be fun. You know. No BS. Just an evening of fun and games.”

“It’s bad enough men think that’s what we’re all about. That we’re useless except in the kitchen or the bedroom. We don’t have to play into their stupid fantasy.”

Silence. Then Jen cleared her throat. “Okay,” she said carefully, “so just forget that I—”

“Not that I couldn’t be some jerk’s idea of a centerfold playmate, if I wanted.”

“Uh, Aimee, look, I have to run, so—”

“I could go to this club with you. Dance, drink, let some guy pick me up for a night of mind-blowing sex!”

The telephone line hummed with silence again. Then Jen spoke.

“So, uh, are you saying you want to go with us?”

Aimee took a deep, deep breath. “You’re damned right I am,” she said.

Twenty minutes later, dressed in a red silk dress she’d bought on sale and never had a reason to wear, ditto for a pair of strappy gold sandals, Aimee took a last look in the mirror, gave her image a quick salute, then headed out the door.

Chapter Two

LUCAS’S CLUB was everything Damian had promised.

Like most hot Manhattan nightspots, it was in a neighborhood that had once been grungy and commercial and now was grungy and upscale. Streets that had once been relegated to the nitty-gritty of daily life now came alive after dark. Warehouses had given way to expensive, exclusive clubs.

Lucas’s place was located in a dark brick building with shuttered windows. There was no sign to indicate that what had once been a factory was now Le Club Hot.

No sign. No published telephone number. You either knew the club existed or you didn’t, which went a long way toward sorting out the clientele, Nicolo thought wryly as he opened a heavy, brass-hinged door and stepped, with Damian, into what might have been the small lobby of an upscale hotel.

The behemoth who greeted them was not someone you’d ever find behind a reception desk. They gave him their names, he checked a list, then smiled.

He pressed a button, and the wall ahead of them slid back.

“Wow,” Damian said softly.

Nicolo had to agree. “Wow” summed it up.

The first thing you noticed was the noise. Music, heavy on bass, went straight into your blood.

Then you realized that the room you’d walked into was huge.

The designer had carefully left the exposed overhead pipes and old brick walls but everything else—the lighting, the endless Lucite bar, the elevated dance floor and the music—was dazzlingly modern.

“You could play American football in here,” Damian murmured. “Especially since the place comes equipped with so many cheerleaders.”

He grinned, and Nicolo grinned back at him. It was true. The room was filled with people, more than half of them women. Young. Stunning. Sexy. Faces recognizable from European and American magazine covers and movies.

What an idiot he’d been, letting what happened this afternoon get him worked up. Damian had it right. This was what he needed. Lights. Music.

Women.

This was the way to relax.

“Barbieri! Aristedes!”

Lucas was making his way through the crowd toward them. The men exchanged handshakes and then Lucas rolled his eyes and grabbed them both in a bear hug.

“Ugly as always,” he said, raising his voice over the pulsating beat of the music, “but not to worry. I’ve told a bunch of lies about you both and made you sound so interesting that people are willing to meet you, despite your looks.”

The three of them grinned. Then Lucas pointed toward a suspended, transparent staircase.

“My table’s up there,” he shouted. “On the mezzanine. It’s quieter…and the view is óptimo!”

He was right. The table overlooked the dance floor and the sound level dropped from deafening to ear-shattering.

And the view was, indeed, excellent.

“What scenery,” Damian said.

He meant, of course, the women. Nicolo nodded in agreement. He’d already acknowledged that the scenery was spectacular. All those lithe, gyrating bodies. The lovely faces…

Was there a woman on the dance floor with eyes the color of violets? With hair the honey-gold of a tigress?

“Nicolo? Which do you prefer?”

Nicolo blinked. Lucas and Damian were looking at him, along with a girl in gold hot pants and a skimpy black tank top.

“To drink,” Lucas said, with a little laugh. “Whiskey? Champagne? The club special? It’s a Mojito. You know, rum, lime juice—”

“Whiskey,” Nicolo said, and told himself to stop being a fool and start having a good time.

But that was a problem.

It turned out you couldn’t have a good time just by telling yourself to have one. You had to relax before you had fun, and now that the woman with the violet eyes had pushed her way into his head, he knew damned well “fun” wasn’t going to happen.

No matter how much he tried.

He ate. He drank. He listened while Lucas and Damian caught up on old times. The three of them hadn’t seen each other in months; there was a lot to talk about and he forced himself to join in the conversation.

After a while, his thoughts drifted. To the woman. To how he’d dealt with her. The more he thought, the angrier he became.

At her.

At himself.

What kind of man let a woman make a fool of him?

“Nicolo?”

Another blink, this time at Damian, who was watching him through slightly narrowed eyes.

“You okay?”

“Yes. Sure. I told you, it’s—it’s this meeting Monday, and—”

Lucas snorted. “My friend, you’re as transparent as glass. What’s on your mind is a woman.”

No. It wasn’t true. Well, yes. There was a woman on his mind but not in the way Lucas meant.

There were no women in his life to think about.

He’d ended an affair a month ago, and grazie a Dio that he had. The lady in question had been like so many others, beautiful and accommodating at first, then simply beautiful and boring.

But then, that was in the nature of things—or was it? Somehow, he couldn’t envision the blonde with the violet eyes ever being accommodating or boring.

She would always be a challenge.

Any other woman, given the situation, would have accepted the apology he’d offered. Hell, any other woman would have done more than that.

He was always lucky with women. They liked him and he liked them. So, any other woman would have smiled and said it was nice of him to say it was his fault but, really, it was hers.

And he’d have understood her smile, returned one of his own and said, well, perhaps they might have a drink while they decided who owed whom an apology…

Nicolo brought his bourbon on the rocks to his lips and took a long drink.

Damn it, the woman was haunting him and for a reason that was insulting.

Such insolence! Why had he tolerated it? Such audacity! And he’d let her get away with it.

His eyes narrowed.

What she’d needed was a real lesson in how a woman should behave. Not that pale excuse of a kiss but something she would have remembered, something that would have shaken her loose of that cold disdain.

He should have dragged her against his body. Taken her mouth, parted her lips with his and filled her with his taste. Let her understand that she was female and he was male and despite the ridiculous conventions of this misbegotten century, what that meant was that he held supremacy when it came to things such as this.

But he had done none of those things. And now, for all he knew, somewhere in this vast city she was laughing at him. At how easily she’d cut him down to size.

Laughing, perhaps, with her lover.

A woman with a face like a madonna’s would surely have a lover.

Would he be a man she could command? Yes. Of course. And what a pity that was because what the lady needed was a lover whose touch would make her tremble. Whose kisses would melt her icy hauteur. Who would make love to her until she begged for mercy…

“Barbieri!”

Nicolo forced the darkness away, looked at the expressions on his friends’ faces—and realized that he had held his glass so tightly it had shattered.

Whiskey puddled on the table.

“Merda,” he growled, and dabbed furiously at the spreading pond of golden liquid with a napkin.

“Never mind that. Did you cut yourself?”

Had he? Nicolo checked.

“No. Not a scratch.” He forced a laugh and held out his hand. “See? Relax, Reyes. There won’t be a lawsuit.”

But Lucas wasn’t buying into the poor attempt at humor.

“Amigo, I’m not the one who needs to relax. You’re wound tighter than a spring.”

Nicolo thought about denying it but what was the point? These men knew him too well.

“You’re right. I am, and I’m sorry I’m spoiling your evening.” He pushed back his chair. “The truth is, I can’t keep my mind on things tonight, so I’m going to head back to my hotel. I told you, that meeting—”

“We’ve known you too long to fall for that. Tough negotiations don’t stress you, Barbieri. You live for them.” Laughing, Damian nudged Lucas in the ribs with his elbow. “It’s a woman. Admit it.”

Nicolo gave a deliberately careless shrug. Maybe if he made light of it…

“Okay,” he said, “it is. But I’ll get over it.”

“Of course you will.” Lucas leaned closer. “And I know the quickest way to do it. It’s like drinking, Nicolo. Remember, back in college? The hair of the dog cure after too much partying? You wake with a hangover, you get rid of it by taking a drink. Well, you have a woman on the brain, you cure that by—”

“Lucas,” a soft voice purred, “darling Lucas, here you are! We’ve been looking everywhere.”

Five women had materialized beside the table. All stunning. All smiling as if they’d found the lost treasure of the Amazons.

“The hair of the dog, my man,” Damian whispered, and Nicolo thought, Why not?

Chairs were dragged over. Introductions were made. Champagne corks popped. After a few minutes, one of the women—her name was Vicki—turned to Nicolo.

“Lucas tells me you’re a royal”

Nicolo looked over her shoulder. Lucas grinned and winked.

“Lucas is a comedian,” he said.

“I’m famous, too.” She giggled. “Well, not yet but someday. Maybe you’ve seen me? I’ve been in—”

A list of plays. Or TV shows. Or something. He didn’t know, didn’t care, and stole a surreptitious glance at his watch. When could he get out of here without insulting the lady or putting a damper on the party?

Not that she wasn’t beautiful. And friendly. She smiled a lot. Put her hand on his arm. Asked him the questions a man likes to be asked.

It was an old game, one he’d played often. The outcome was always understood. And pleasant.

Amazingly pleasant.

He felt his blood tingle. Damian was right. Lucas, too. This was what he needed. A willing, beautiful woman. A game with a predictable ending. A night’s pleasure.

Wasn’t it bad enough the woman with the violet eyes had made a fool of him once? Was he going to let her do it again by keeping him from what waited for him now?

Nicolo pushed back his chair. Took Vicki’s hand.

“Dance with me.”

He led her down the steps to the dance floor. Salsa music blasted the air, its insistent beat almost as sexual as the moves of Vicki’s ripe body lightly brushing his.

Yes. This was good. This was what he needed…

But it wasn’t. It was the wrong body, teasing his. The wrong face, lifted to his and smiling. The wrong eyes, filled with heat and desire.

Basta, he thought in disgust, and he put his arms around the woman and brought her tightly against him as the music segued into something slow and sexy.

She settled close against him as if she’d been waiting for the invitation. Her hair tickled his nose. It was stiff and smelled of hairspray.

Those honeyed curls this afternoon had been soft and fragrant with rain.

“It’s terribly noisy here,” Vicki said, her breath warm against his ear.

Why don’t we find a quieter place? That was the next line. His, or in these days of supposed equality, it could be—

“Why don’t we find a quieter place?” she whispered.

Nicolo cleared his throat.

“You know,” he said, “I think that’s—I think it’s—” An excellent idea. “I think I’ll have to take a rain check on that,” he heard himself say.

She looked as surprised as he felt but, damn it, he didn’t want this woman.

No substitutes, he thought as the music began to pound again, and the need, the desire he’d been suppressing all these hours ignited and threatened to consume him.

He knew what he wanted. What he needed. And there had to be a way, had to be something he could do to—

Nicolo caught his breath. He stopped dancing, let the other dancers and the music swirl around him.

There she was!

Honey-colored curls. Violet eyes. The woman who was driving him insane. No black suede coat. No hood. No boots. Instead she wore a clinging scrap of crimson silk that barely covered her body. Gold sandals, all straps and sky-high, needle-sharp heels. She was dancing, if you wanted to call it that. Moving in a man’s arms. Breasts swaying. Hips rotating. Head up, eyes locked to the man’s face, mouth turned up in a smile…

A smile she had denied him.

“Nicolo?”

Vicki, whatever her name was, said his name. Said something more and put her hand on his chest. He brushed it aside. Stepped away. Abandoned her in the middle of the crowded dance floor.

The part of his brain that was of this century knew all that. Knew, too, that his response to the events of the afternoon might not be entirely rational.

But the part that was as old, as savagely male, as time whispered, This is what I want. And I’m going to have it.

And Nicolo heard nothing else.

The music had turned wild; the throbbing pulse matched the insistent thump of his blood, the beat of his heart…

The fury eating inside him.

Fate, always capricious, had decided to favor him tonight. The woman who’d made a fool of him was here.

Now, he could even the score.

He shouldered his way through the crowd, eyes locked to his quarry. She was oblivious to him. Good, he thought grimly. He wanted to reach her before she had time to think.

But halfway there, she suddenly stopped dancing. Her partner said something; she didn’t answer. Instead she moved out of his arms and stood like a doe at the edge of a clearing, sensing the presence of a hungry predator.

Later, Nicolo would wonder if it weren’t the whole world that had gone still and waited, waited, waited.

A minute, an eternity, swept by. Then the blonde raised her head and looked directly at him.

He let a tight smile curve his mouth. Whatever beat its wings within him must have been in that smile, because the color drained from her face.

She took a step back.

He thought, again, of the doe.

Run, he thought.

And, just as if she’d read his mind, the woman with the violet eyes swung away from him and fled.

Nicolo didn’t hesitate. He went after her.

Chapter Three

YOU COULDN’T end up in the same place with the same man twice in one day. Not in a town the size of New York.

At first, when she saw him, Aimee told herself it had to be some other tall, dark-haired guy. There were tons of dark-haired, good-looking men in the city.

A second glance and that hope vanished. It was the overbearing, supermacho jerk who’d kissed her. It had to be. The truth was, nobody else would be as…

All right. No other man could possibly be as easy on the eyes. He was despicable—but he was gorgeous.

The last few minutes, she’d felt…What? A premonition? She didn’t believe in any of that stuff, but how else to explain that tingle at her nape? That feeling that eyes were following her as she danced with Tom or Tim or, dear God, she couldn’t even remember the name of the guy who’d bought her a drink, then led her onto the dance floor.

He was nice enough. Good-looking enough. And he was working hard at making an impression.

And he wasn’t the stranger from this afternoon.

No way would Tom, or whoever he was, grab a woman and kiss her, look at her through icy deep-blue eyes in a way that would make the memory of him lodge itself in her brain.

She hated men like the Neanderthal, no matter how hot-looking a Neanderthal he might be.

So, yes, it was good that the guy dancing with her wasn’t like that…Wasn’t it?

Of course it was.

He’d been coming on to her like crazy. And she’d tried her best to respond. Smiled. Laughed. Gone onto the dance floor and did her best to lose herself in the music, working off her frustrations to its insistent beat the way she’d have worked them off in the gym.

And then, suddenly, she’d felt a tingle, as if someone was watching her.

Well, of course, someone was watching her! People danced, other people watched.

Aimee had danced harder, throwing herself into the music with abandon, and the guy with her kept saying things like, “Wow, you’re good, baby,” and “That’s it, babe, way to go,” as if he were cheering her on.

Objectifying her, she’d thought with detached clarity—except, wasn’t that part of the deal tonight?

She’d come here to have fun, she’d thought grimly. To pick up a man. She was going to have a good time.

Except, she wasn’t.

She despised places like this. Not the club itself: it was, she had to admit, spectacular. It was what went with the place. The noise. The lights. The crowd. The desperate pickup lines.

And this was not the time to turn into an anthropologist studying the natives.

So she’d agreed when Jen said it was absolutely fantastic, laughed at what she assumed were jokes, let a nice-looking guy buy her a margarita, tell her she was the most beautiful woman in the place and lead her to the dance floor.

And tried not to cringe each time Ted or Tim or Tom called her “baby.”

And worked really, really hard at pretending she was having fun when the truth was, she didn’t belong here, didn’t want to be here, certainly didn’t want to go home with Ted-Tom-Tim or anybody else for a night of meaningless sex.

She’d never treated sex casually. Never had a one-night stand. Never, not once.

Why on earth had she thought she’d want to now?

Because, a sly voice inside her had whispered, you thought it just might make you forget the stranger. The one with the hard, beautiful face and the body that was all muscle.

The one who kissed you as if he had the right, as if he could kiss you, do anything to you that he wanted.

That you wanted.

And that was when Aimee felt the tingling, looked around…And saw him. The stranger from this afternoon. Watching her with what could only be fury in his eyes.

He was angry? At her? That was crazy. She was the one who was angry. And “angry” wasn’t the word. She’d been the one harassed by him. By his attitude. His arrogance. His unwanted kiss.

His eyes met hers. Everything faded. The insistent throb of the music, the people around her, everything.

Aimee stopped dancing.

It was all she could do not to run.

The look in his eyes terrified her…but the slow heat spreading through her veins terrified her even more.

She took a long, deep breath. Or tried to. For some reason, she couldn’t seem to get any air into her lungs.

Suddenly the rage in his expression changed. Something else glittered in his dark blue eyes. Something male that she despised.

The innate male determination to dominate.

To dominate, in bed and out.

With breathtaking swiftness, she felt a rush of heat sweep through her. Her nipples tightened; a honeyed warmth spread low in her belly.

No, she thought frantically, no! She’d never want someone like him to put his hands on her. His mouth on her. To take her, hard and fast, again and again until she collapsed in his arms…

He started toward her, heedless of the people in his way, everything about him focused, with hot intensity, on her.

And she turned and ran.

She went through the crowd blindly, banging into people, ignoring their indignant protests. Her heart was racing.

God, oh God, oh God!

He was the hunter. She was his prey. A sob rose in her throat and, just in time, she spotted the flashing neon sign that marked one of the club’s unisex bathrooms.

Jen had dragged her into it earlier.

“Doesn’t look like a bathroom at all,” Jen had bubbled.

Right now, it looked like a sanctuary.

Aimee pulled open the door. Slammed it after her. Started to turn the lock…

Bang!

The door flew open and the man burst into the room. She shrieked and fell back, reached behind her to the vanity. Wrapped her hand around a heavy bottle of something. Hand lotion. Body oil. Who gave a damn what it was? It was a weapon.

That was what counted.

“Don’t,” she said.

Her voice shook. Was that the reason for the little smile that began at the corner of his mouth?

“Get out of here! Do you hear me? Go away or I’ll scream.”

He laughed. She couldn’t blame him. There wasn’t a chance in the world anyone would hear her. You wouldn’t hear a siren above the music. It was muted here, but it still filled the room like the beat of a giant heart.

She raised the bottle over her head. “One step,” she panted, “just one, and I’ll smash you with this!”

He laughed. “You already tried that, remember?”

“I’m not kidding! You—you unlock that door and get the hell out of here or so help me—”

He started toward her. She let fly with the bottle but he dodged and it shattered against the wall.

“Listen to me.” Her voice trembled; she hated herself for it but she knew damned well there was nothing she could do to prevent it. “This is a terrible mistake. You won’t—you won’t get away with—”

“At first,” he said, his tone almost conversational, “I thought, ‘Well, that is just the way she deals with men.’ ”

She’d noticed his accent this afternoon. You couldn’t miss that husky, sexy quality to his voice. It seemed more obvious now, his pronunciation more careful.

“I told myself it was not important.”

Aimee swallowed. “Look, what happened this afternoon—”

“Still,” he said, in that same easy way, as if he were explaining the day’s news to a friend, “still, I admit, it bothered me. That a woman should be so impolite. So downright rude. But I put it out of my head.”

“I didn’t do anything! It was—it was just something that happened.”

“Just something that happened.” He nodded. “Yes, that’s an excellent way to put it. In fact, that is exactly the conclusion I reached.”

He was inches away from her now, so close that she had to tilt her head up to see his eyes. Even in her heels, he was much taller than she. And, God, much bigger.

“But then I saw you, here.”

“You mean, you followed me here!”

“You give yourself too much importance, cara. Do you really think I have nothing better to do than to spend my time following you?” A little muscle was ticking in his cheek. “I came here with friends. To enjoy the evening.” He paused. “And, it would seem, so did you.”

“Yes. And—and my date will be looking for—”

“Your date didn’t move a finger to prevent you from abandoning him. Or to keep me from going after you.” He paused, and she saw his eyes darken. “I noticed that you treated your gentleman friend differently than you treated me.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Cara. Please, don’t try my patience. You laughed with him. Smiled when he spoke to you.”

“Of course. I mean, I know him—”

“Really? What’s his name?”

“Ted,” Aimee said quickly.

“No. It is not.”

It had been a gamble, but a good one. Nicolo watched as the woman worried her bottom lip. He’d guessed right. She had no idea who she’d been dancing with. She’d picked the man up.

For many of its patrons, that was the purpose of a place like this.

Her business, of course.

That was what he’d told himself, when he first saw her with the man.

But he’d watched as she smiled. Flirted. Shook her hips, her breasts. Practiced the fine art of seduction.

For another man.

Not for him.

Not for him, he’d thought, and suddenly he’d known that confronting her, kissing her, would not be enough.

He wanted her.

It didn’t make sense but it didn’t have to. His body, his blood, knew what he needed.

And what he needed was this beautiful, condescending stranger dancing with him…

Dancing in his bed.

Slowly he reached out, laced one finger under the thin strap of her red dress and tugged. She stumbled toward him, arms raised, hands balled into fists.

He caught her wrists in one hand.

“Don’t struggle,” he said in a low voice. “It will only make things worse.”

“Please.” Her voice trembled. “Please, don’t do this.”

“I told you this afternoon, you lack manners, cara.”

“Let me go! Damn you—”

“The next time ‘something happens,’ as you called it, between you and a man, you will know how to respond.”

“If you’re after an apology…”

“And if I were, would you finally offer one?”

She was terrified; he could see it in her face, feel it in the trembling of her body. Her gaze locked on his, and he felt a rush of disappointment.

She was desperate, desperate enough so she was, in fact, going to apologize. And then, as a civilized man, he’d have to let her go…

Wrong.

Her chin lifted; terrified or not, her eyes blazed with defiance.

“Only a barbarian would think that taking a woman by force is the way to get even for damage to his ego.”

“Is that what you think? That I’m going to rape you?” The muscle flickered in his jaw again; he cupped her face with his free hand and held it steady. “You know better.” His voice was low and husky. “I saw the way you looked at me a few minutes ago.”

Color stained her cheeks. “I don’t know what you—”

“Yes,” he said, “you damned well do.”

His head lowered to hers, and he kissed her.

His mouth was hard. Hungry. Hot against hers. Aimee jerked against the restraint of his hand, tried to twist her face away but he wouldn’t permit it.

Instead he brought her closer, crushing her tightly against him so that she could feel the strength of him, the power…

The thrust of his straining erection.

A whimper rose in her throat.

“Stop,” she said, against his mouth, but he went on kissing her, his fingers sliding into her hair, twisting the curls around his hand, backing her against the wall so that now she was pressed against him from breast to groin.

“Kiss me back,” he said in a thick whisper.

No, she told herself frantically. She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t…

Aimee gave a strangled cry, rose to him and opened her mouth against his.

He groaned. Let go of her wrists and threw his arm around her hips, lifting her against him. His tongue teased her lips, slipped between them and she tasted his hunger, his need, his rampant masculinity.

“Say it,” he growled against her mouth. “Tell me what you want. What you’ve wanted ever since this afternoon.”

Blind to logic, to reason, blind to anything but the feel of him, the scent of him, Aimee gave up lying.

“You,” she whispered. “Only you. All day. All evening. I couldn’t think of anything else, couldn’t get you out of my head—”

He cupped her face in his hands. Kissed her, deeply. Thrust his leg between hers and she moaned at the feel of it against the tender flesh between her thighs.

She moved against him. Moved again, but it wasn’t enough, wasn’t enough…

She moaned.

The sound damned near sent Nicolo over the edge.

The taste of her was exquisite. She was strawberries and cream, spring rain and summer sun. She was everything a man could imagine a woman might be, if only in a dream.

He lifted her from the floor. Her arms rose; she wound them around his neck.

“Yes,” he said, and he grasped her slender thighs and brought them around his hips.

He thought of taking her to his hotel. To her apartment. To a place where he could undress her, touch her, watch her eyes as he entered her.

But not now.

Now, he needed this. Needed her. Needed to bury himself in her, needed it more than his next breath.

Locked in a dance as old as time, mouths fused in mutual hunger, Nicolo carried Aimee to the marble vanity. Sat her on its edge. Fumbled between them. Unzipped. Freed himself. Put his hand between her thighs, groaning as he felt the wet heat of her against his fingers, and tore aside the scrap of silk that kept her from him.

“Look at me,” he commanded.

She did, fixing those incredible violet eyes on his face.

“Yes,” she said, and he thrust forward, sank into her, felt her close around him.

She cried out instantly; he felt the pulse of her muscles as she came and then he exploded within her, came in a rush of almost unbearable ecstasy.

She trembled.

Then she gave a little sob and dropped her head on his shoulder.

Nicolo put his arms around her. Stroked her silken hair. Whispered to her, his native language soft on his tongue while he tried to figure out what in hell had just happened.

This was not the first time he’d had quick, hot sex. It was not the first time he’d had sex in the hidden heart of a public place.

Both could be exciting.

The truth was, sex was always exciting. But this, what had just happened…He’d never experienced anything like it.

He didn’t even know this woman’s name.

He hadn’t used a condom.

Madre del dio, was he losing his mind?

And then she sighed. Her breath tickled his throat. She lifted her head and looked at him, her eyes filled with uncertainty, her mouth gently swollen from his kisses, and Nicolo forgot everything but the soft, sweet feel of her mouth, her arms, her thighs.

“I don’t—I don’t know what happened.” Her voice was shaky, her face white except for two spots of color high on her cheeks. “I never—God, I never—”

“No. Nor have I.”

She started to speak again and he knew what she would say, that this was wrong, that he had to let her go.

He knew of only one way to keep her from saying those words.

He kissed her.

Gently at first but then—then, the fierce wave of desire swept over him. And over her. He felt her swift intake of breath, the whispered plea against his lips, and suddenly he was deep inside her again, rocking against her, swallowing her cries, coming when she came and knowing that it still wasn’t enough, that he needed more…

Someone pounded on the locked door.

The woman in his arms blanched.

“It’s all right,” he whispered, but she shook her head.

“No. Someone’s outside. They’ll see—”

He brushed his lips over hers. Then he set her on her feet and did what needed to be done to make himself presentable. She did the same, but he saw that her hands were shaking.

“Cara. Don’t be—”

“Hey, you gonna be in there all night?”

Nicolo looked down into the face of the woman he’d just made love to. “It’s time we introduced ourselves,” he said softly. “My name is—”

She put her palm over his mouth. “No. No names. This was—it was only a dream.”

He caught her hand, pressed his lips to it, then closed her fingers over the kiss.

“A dream. Si. And there is no need for the dream to end so soon.”

“No. I can’t. I—”

“We can,” he said fiercely. “We can do anything, if this is a dream.”

She shook her head but he drew her into his arms and kissed her, telling her without words how it could be between them, how it would be when they had all the time and privacy they needed.

Her lips softened. Clung to his. She sighed, and he cupped her face with his hands.

“Come with me,” he whispered.

She shook her head again; he kissed her again.

“Is there another man?”

“No,” she said quickly. “But—”

“We’re adults, cara. Both of us are free. Come with me. Be with me tonight.”

He kissed her and the world spun around them. Then he lifted his head and looked down into her eyes.

“Yes,” she said softly.

Nicolo felt his heart soar. He encircled her waist with his arm, drew her against him, led her to the door and unlocked it.

A man was waiting outside.

“It’s about time. I mean, how long did you…” His gaze fell on Aimee and he raised his eyebrows. “Oh. I get it. Hey, no problem. I had a babe like this with me, I’d—”

“Watch your mouth,” Nicolo said, his voice cold and flat.

The man’s face went pale. He stepped out of their way. And Aimee thought, What am I doing?

She’d just had sex with a stranger. A stranger she knew nothing about, except that he could be hard and cold and terrifying…

Her nameless lover drew her close. “Don’t think,” he said, as if he’d read her mind. “Not tonight.”

She looked up at him, into those blue eyes that could go from winter ice to summer sun. Remembered the feel of his hands on her. The feel of him in her, and let the last vestige of sanity slip away.

There was a taxi at the curb. It took them uptown, to a hotel on the park.

He had a suite. It was huge. Luxurious.

Was money a good character reference? she thought, and would have laughed but he was taking her into his arms, slipping the straps of her dress from her shoulders. Cupping her breasts, tasting them, ohgod,ohgod,ohgod…

The hours after that were a blur of excitement. Of whispers and sighs and explorations. Aimee lost herself in a sea of sensation…

And shot awake in the gray hours before dawn, suddenly aware that she was wrapped in the embrace of a man she didn’t know.

A hot tide of shame engulfed her.

Trembling, she disentangled herself from the possessive curve of his arm. Dressed in the dark, slipped from the sumptuous suite and sneaked down the service staircase because the thought of facing the elevator operator made her feel ill.

Moments later, Nicolo came awake and reached for his lover.

The bed, the sitting room, the bathroom were empty.

He cursed, pulled on trousers and shirt, hurried out into the corridor, but she was gone. He rang for the elevator. No, the operator said, he hadn’t taken anyone down to the lobby.

He went to the reception desk, demanded to know if the clerk had seen a woman with honey-blond hair and violet eyes. The answer there was the same.

She had vanished.

As the sun rose over the city, Nicolo paced his rooms while he tried to figure out how in hell he would find a nameless woman in a city of eight million people.

The one certainty was that he would find her.

Nicolo Barbieri did not believe in defeat.

By Sunday evening, Nicolo had learned an ugly lesson.

A man didn’t have to believe in defeat to be subjected to it.

You couldn’t find a woman without a name, not even if you slipped hundred-dollar bills to the club’s bouncer and all its bartenders.

They all said the same thing. Lots of women came through the doors on a Saturday night. So what if one had hair the color of honey and eyes the color of violets? That didn’t mean much to them.

All right, Nicolo told himself coldly.

It didn’t meant much to him, either.

A woman had let him pick her up and take her to bed. She’d probably done the same thing dozens of times before. So what if he never saw her again? All that bothered him was that she’d slipped from his arms without a word.

It didn’t, she didn’t, mean a thing.

He told himself that as he showered Monday morning. Told himself, too, all that mattered was what had brought him to New York. The meeting at SCB with James Black. The acquisition of the old man’s kingdom. Nothing was as important as—

The phone rang.

Nicolo flung open the shower door and grabbed for the receiver.

The woman. It had to be.

But it wasn’t. It was Black’s secretary, calling to cancel the meeting. Black was indisposed. The secretary would be in touch when he was available again.

Nicolo said all the right things. Then he hung up the phone and stared blindly at the mirror over the vanity.

Was it true? Or had Black simply decided not to see him? The old man had a reputation. He liked to treat people like marionettes.

The woman with the violet eyes was the same. She seduced a man, gave him a few hours’ taste of what it was like to possess her and then she slipped away.

Nicolo’s hands knotted into fists.

Black would pay by selling him SCB. As for the woman…She would pay, too. Somehow, he would find her and teach her what it meant to walk out on him.

He was as certain of that as he was of his next breath.

Chapter Four

SUMMER had finally arrived.

No more chilly wind and soaking rain. Instead the city was wrapped in soft breezes and warm sunshine.

The weather was so spectacular that even New Yorkers smiled at each other.

Aimee didn’t notice.

Memories of what she’d done, that she’d gone to bed with a stranger, haunted her, intruded when she least expected.

Walking down the street, she’d turn a corner and see a tall, broad-shouldered man with dark hair and her heart would skip a beat.

Or she’d be in bed, asleep, and suddenly he’d materialize in her dreams.

She’d see his beautiful, hard face. His powerful body. And he’d touch her, kiss her, do things to her no one had ever done, make her feel things she’d never felt…

Until one night in a stranger’s arms.

She tried not to think about that because it seemed so wrong. Still, in her sleep, she’d moan at his touch and awake, shaken and breathless, her skin hot, her body aching for his possession even though her conscious mind knew she despised him, despised herself…

No. It was not turning out to be a good summer, she thought as she stepped from the shower on a balmy June morning. The man. The ugliness of what she’d done.

Then, that same weekend, her grandfather’s stroke.

Her mouth tightened.

Good old Bradley had rushed to the rescue. By the time she reached the hospital, her cousin was there with two of his SCB cronies. He had a piece of paper in his hand, James’s signature scrawled across it.

Something that he and his pals swore was James’s signature, anyway.

“Uncle has made me his surrogate until he recovers,” he’d told her with ill-concealed triumph.

Aimee tossed aside her bath towel and went to the closet.

She should have fought him. Hired an attorney. But she’d felt such despair that Sunday, such self-loathing, that fighting Bradley was the last thing she’d wanted to do.

Bradley settled into James’s office and immediately began making decisions that left her reeling, but there was nothing she could do. He was in charge until Grandfather recovered. She’d thought of going directly to James, but she had no way of knowing what condition he was in. He was in seclusion at his home, surrounded by doctors, nurses and therapists, and supposedly had left strict orders that he did not want to see visitors.

Hands tied, Aimee had only been able to wait. And wonder.

Yesterday, the waiting had ended.

James’s secretary—Bradley’s secretary, now—had phoned and told her she was expected at Stafford-Coleridge-Black promptly at ten this morning.

“I’m sorry, Miss Black,” the woman said crisply when Aimee started to ask questions. “I can’t tell you anything except to assure you that you’ll have all the answers tomorrow.”

As if she needed them, Aimee thought bitterly. She knew exactly what would happen this morning. Her cousin, seated behind James’s imposing desk, would flash his oily smile and tell her he was in charge, permanently.

She’d fight him, of course, just on principle. But she’d lose. Bradley had that document and witnesses. She had nothing—certainly not the money for a protracted court battle.

Lately she didn’t even have the energy.

She was tired all the time. Exhausted, really. Plagued by bouts of nausea.

Stress, she’d told herself. Over her grandfather because, despite everything, he was her blood and she loved him. Over what would become of Stafford-Coleridge-Black, because she loved it, too.

And stress over that night. What she’d done. That she’d let a stranger seduce her—

Except, he hadn’t. She’d gone to him willingly. Eagerly. Making love with him was the most exciting thing she’d ever done. Sex had never been like that before. Sex would never be like that again, especially since she couldn’t imagine being with another man…

Aimee blinked.

She had more important things on her mind this morning.

Yesterday, she’d finally gone to her doctor for a checkup. He’d listened to her litany of complaints, examined her, had his nurse take blood and urine samples and told her he’d have lab reports in a few days.

“Not to worry, Ms. Black,” he’d said briskly. “I suspect whatever ails you is simple to deal with.”

Vitamins, she’d thought. More rest.

Fewer dreams.

Still, it was hard not to worry until the lab results were in and now, on top of everything else, she had this meeting Bradley had orchestrated, undoubtedly so he could crow with triumph as he told he’d taken permanent control of the reins.

When she was dressed—cotton summer suit, low heels, light makeup—Aimee looked in the mirror. The woman looking back at her was the woman she really was. Intelligent. Educated. Competent.

She bore no resemblance to the woman in the bathroom mirror that night at the club…

No. She would not let those memories take over this morning.

Bradley was about to knife her in the back, but she’d be damned if she’d let him see her bleed.

She would show absolutely no emotion today, no matter what happened.

That was the plan, and it would have worked…except for what she found waiting for her in the Stafford-Coleridge-Black boardroom.

Grandfather, not Bradley, sat ramrod-straight in his usual chair at one end of the long mahogany conference table.

The stranger she’d gone to bed with was seated at the other.

Nicolo was not in a good mood.

He was in New York for the first time since the episode three months before and he’d found the night had tainted his feelings about the city.

Unfortunate.

He’d always enjoyed spending time in Manhattan. Now, he couldn’t wait to see the last of it. And, he thought, with a not-so-discreet glance at his Tag Heuer watch as he sat waiting for the meeting in James Black’s office to begin, he would be doing that soon.

Just this one last session with Black and the deal he and the old man had worked on the past two weeks, via a volley of faxes and phone calls, would be completed.

Yesterday, when they’d met face-to-face, Black told him there was just one last point to agree upon.

“Just one,” he’d repeated, his voice quavering because of the stroke that had, it was said, almost killed him.

“And that is?” Nicolo had replied.

Black had wagged a bony finger. “Nothing a smart man won’t be willing to accede to, Prince Barbieri, I assure you.”

Nicolo had almost reminded him that he didn’t use his title, but he’d decided to play along. Black obviously liked the idea that Nicolo was royalty. Why do anything to spoil the finalization of the deal?

Not that he was concerned over this last point, especially since he was sure he knew what it was. They’d agreed on a price. On a takeover date. What could be left to discuss?

Only Black’s repeated concern that the company his ancestors had founded not lose its identity among Nicolo’s holdings.

The old man, he was sure, was going to want some sort of guarantee, and Nicolo had come up with one.

He would keep the bank’s name, Stafford-Coleridge-Black, intact.

In fact, he’d almost said so yesterday in hopes of avoiding this morning’s meeting, but he suspected that giving in without at least a small battle would only make Black ask for something more.

So he’d agreed to today’s meeting, which had meant spending another night in the city.

Another night plagued by memories of how he’d let a woman make a fool of him.

Dio, how ridiculous he was! He’d had a night of sex—the best sex of his life, and that was saying a great deal. A night of fantastic sex, with no morning-after to deal with. No female batting her lashes over coffee, telling him how wonderful he was, asking when she would see him again.

Ask half a dozen men what was wrong with that scenario and they’d laugh and say there wasn’t a thing wrong with it.

Mind-blowing sex. No names. No commitment. A man’s fantasy.

Then why was it driving him insane, that she’d left his bed while he slept? Why should it bother him?

He still winced when he recalled how he’d gone searching for her in the hall. Made a fool of himself with the elevator operator, the night clerk. Taken a cab to that damned club and demanded answers.

Embarrassing? A little…

Hell. A lot.

A woman should not be the one who walked out of a relationship. Even if that “relationship” only lasted a few hours. Yes, he knew all about the Age of Equality but a woman had never walked out on him, not under any circumstances.

This one had, and he didn’t like it.

That was why she was in his head, even now. Even when he was about to complete a deal he’d worked on, dreamed of, for years. Instead of concentrating on it, he was thinking about a woman who—

“Prince Barbieri?”

Who should consider herself fortunate he’d had no way to locate her because if he had—

“Prince Barbieri. Sir? If you please—”

“Si,” Nicolo said, and cleared his throat. “Are you ready to begin? I was, ah, I was just reading through my notes, and—”

And, he looked up.

The world tilted.

The woman with the violet eyes was standing in the doorway staring at him just as he was staring at her, as if one of them was an apparition.

He saw the color drain from her face. Saw her mouth drop open. Saw the swift rise and fall of her breasts beneath the jacket of a demure blue suit.

“Demure” was the word for her, all right. Whoever she was, whatever she was doing here, today she was playing the part of a virgin.

A muscle knotted in Nicolo’s jaw.

He shoved back his chair. Rose to his feet, his eyes never leaving her. She took a quick step back. Her lips formed a silent plea.

No!

He forgot everything. The boardroom. The old man. The deal he’d worked so long to finalize.

“Yes,” he said grimly. “Oh, most definitely yes, cara!”

She shook her head. Stumbled back another step…

“Do you two know each other?” Black asked.

Nicolo swung his head toward the old man. “What?”

“I said, have you met my granddaughter before, Your Highness?”

Nicolo, a man who had glibly talked his way into the presence of captains of industry and heads of nations during his determined rise to the top, opened his mouth, then shut it again.

Black’s granddaughter? This—this creature who would sleep with a stranger and then disappear into the night was his granddaughter?

Yes. Of course. A spoiled rich brat, accustomed to playing a seductive nymph by night and a sweet virgin by day. He’d seen lots of women like this. The rich seemed to specialize in breeding them.

“Grandfather.” Her voice shook but Nicolo had to give her credit for recovering fast. “I—I didn’t realize you were busy. I’ll come back later. This afternoon. Or tomorrow. Or—”

“Prince Barbieri? Please, sit down. You, too, Aimee. This meeting very much concerns you.”

Her stricken gaze swept from the old man to Nicolo.

Nicolo narrowed his eyes. What the hell was going on here? The temptation to tell Black he would not talk business in front of the woman was strong, but he suspected Black would not back down. He wanted her here, but why?

Nicolo had no choice but to learn why.

“What a pleasant surprise,” he said, his tone silken, “Miss…Is it Miss Black?”

She nodded. “That’s—that’s correct.”

“Ah. In that case, please, join us.”

The look she gave him told him she’d regained her composure.

“My grandfather’s already asked me to stay. I don’t need your invitation.”

“Aimee!”

“No. That’s all right, Signore Black.” Nicolo drew his lips back in a cold smile. “Your granddaughter is right. These are your offices, not mine.”

“But not for long,” the old man said.

Aimee looked at him. “What does that mean?”

“Sit down, Aimee, and you’ll find out.”

Nicolo pulled out the chair beside his. “An excellent suggestion, Miss Black.” His voice hardened. “Sit down.”

He saw her throat move as she swallowed. Then she raised her chin, ignored him and took the seat to the right of her grandfather. Nicolo sat down, too, and Black cleared his throat.

“Well,” he said briskly, “you haven’t answered my question. Do you know each other?”

“We—we might have met before,” Aimee said.

“Have we?” Nicolo flashed another icy smile. “Perhaps your memory is better than mine. After all, if we’d met, we’d know each other’s names, wouldn’t we?”

Color painted crimson patches on her cheeks but when she spoke, her tone was cool.

“I really don’t see that it matters.” She turned to her grandfather. “Who is this man? And why is he here?”

Black folded his gnarled hands on the highly polished wood before him.

“Aimee, this is Nicolo Barbieri. Prince Nicolo Barbieri, of Rome.”

Her expression showed how little impressed she was by his title.

“I suppose you expected to find Bradley.” Black glanced at Nicolo. “My nephew and Aimee’s cousin.”

Aimee didn’t answer. She was stunned by the presence of the stranger she’d slept with. Why was he here? And what was he going to say about that night?

“Aren’t you curious as to why Bradley isn’t present, Aimee?”

A good question. Bradley would never miss the chance to see her reaction as control of SCB was placed permanently in his hands.

Aimee sat up straight. Finding this—this man here had driven logical thought out of her head and she could not let that happen, not if there was the slightest chance of talking sense to her grandfather.

“I am curious,” she said. “Knowing Bradley, I’d assume he’d want to be here to gloat.”

James chuckled. “As you can see,” he told Nicolo, “my granddaughter believes in being frank.” He turned his attention to Aimee. “But Bradley has nothing to gloat about. I am, as you can see, in control of things again and after examining the records of the past three months, I can see that I was wrong to put Bradley in charge.”

Aimee put her hands in her lap and clenched them into fists.

“I’m glad you realize that, Grandfather.”

James nodded. “It’s the reason you’re here today.”

“Excuse me,” Nicolo said with barely concealed impatience, “but I would like to be let in on what is happening here, Signore Black. What has this woman—”

“My granddaughter. My own flesh and blood.”

“What has she to do with our agreement?”

“What agreement?” Aimee said, looking from her grandfather to Nicolo.

“Aimee believes she should take over as head of Stafford-Coleridge-Black, Prince Barbieri.”

Nicolo’s mouth twitched. A woman, this woman, in charge of a private bank worth billions? He would have laughed, but the old man’s expression was serious.

At least now he understood why Aimee Black was in the room. Her grandfather wanted her present for the announcement of his decision to sell the bank to Nicolo. Was it because he thought she’d take the news better than hearing it another way? Was it because Black thought, as he did, that her hope to head SCB was laughable?

Nicolo didn’t give a damn.

For weeks, he’d imagined all the ways in which he could get even with this woman but what was about to happen was better than anything he’d considered. Her shock when she learned that he, of all people, was going to get what she so obviously—so foolishly—wanted, was more than he could have hoped for.

Sometimes, he thought, sitting back in his chair, sometimes, a man got very, very lucky.

“My granddaughter worked here summers for many years.”

“How nice,” Nicolo purred.

“She studied finance, economics and business.”

Nicolo tried to look impressed. Amazing, what they taught rich girls in boarding school these days.

“She knows how I felt about keeping SCB in the family.”

Nicolo nodded. “Unfortunately,” he said politely, “fate did not cooperate.”

“No. Not until now.”

Nicolo frowned. Even a prince could smell a rat when it got close enough. “I’m afraid I don’t understand, Signore Black.”

James looked at Aimee. “How badly do you want to keep Stafford-Coleridge-Black in our family?” he said softly.

Aimee’s heart began to race. “You know the answer to that, Grandfather.”

“Now, just a moment, Black.” Nicolo sat forward, his eyes narrowed and fixed on the old man’s face. “We have a deal.”

“What deal?” Aimee said.

“We have a tentative agreement, Prince Barbieri. Subject, as you know, to the outcome of this meeting.”

“I do not like being hustled,” Nicolo said sharply.

“Hustled?”

“Hustled. Played for a fool. Pushed for more money.”

“This is not about money, Your Highness.”

“Dio, will you stop calling me that? Call me by my last name. My first name. Just stop with the nonsense.” Nicolo slapped his hand on the table. “Damn it, just tell me what you want.”

James took a long breath.

“I want this institution to be in the hands of someone with experience. Someone with a record of achievement that I can trust.”

“That someone is me,” Nicolo said coldly, “and we both know it.”

“I also want it to be the legacy I leave to future generations of Blacks. Call it pride, call it what you will, Barbieri, but I don’t wish to see two hundred years disappear.”

“I understand.” Nicolo took a breath, too. For a couple of minutes, he’d thought the old man was trying to tell him the sale was off. Impossible, of course. Black was not a sentimentalist. He would never leave the bank in the hands of an irresponsible female. “And that is why I’m sure what I say next will please you, signore. I’ve decided to retain the name of the bank. It will be known as Stafford-Coleridge-Black, just as it has for generations.”

Aimee snorted. Nicolo shot her a warning look.

“Do you find this amusing, signorina?”

“I find it arrogant, signore. Can you actually believe my grandfather is naïve enough to think you’ve decided to keep a name that’s worth its weight in gold in financial circles as an act of kindness?”

Nicolo gave her a long, cold look. Then he turned to James.

“With all due respect,” he said, in a tone that made it clear the words were a polite lie, “I will not continue this meeting with your granddaughter present.”

“With all due respect,” Aimee snapped, “you are the outsider here, Prince Barbieri.”

“You know nothing about this.”

“I know everything about it.”

Nicolo’s mouth thinned. “What you know,” he said slowly, “has nothing to do with boardrooms or corporations or responsibility. The only person here who does not know that is your grandfather.”

Aimee sprang to her feet. “You—you no good, insolent son of a—”

“Stop it!” James’s voice was sharp. “Aimee. You are to show the prince respect.”

“Respect? If you knew—if you only knew what this man is really like. If you knew the truth about him—”

“Tell him,” Nicolo said softly. “Go on, Miss Black. Why not explain things to your grandfather?”

Aimee stared at him, eyes glittering with angry tears, lips pouting with suppressed rage, breasts rising and falling with each breath.

It made him remember how she had looked that night, in his arms.

In his bed.

With a swiftness that stunned him, he felt his body harden.

“Why is he here?” she said, her voice rising. “I demand to know the reason!”

James Black looked from his granddaughter to the one man he was certain could guide the company he loved through the twenty-first century. Bradley couldn’t do it. Aimee had tried to make him see that, and she’d been right. In the short time the boy had been at the helm, the company had lost clients and come close to taking dangerous changes of direction.

That left only one other Black to head the bank.

Aimee.

In the endless weeks of his recuperation, James had finally reviewed the proposals she’d made and he’d ignored. They were, he’d been forced to admit, good.

Excellent, actually.

And Aimee was of his blood.

But she was also a woman. A young woman. Even if he managed to convince himself that her sex was not a drawback, her inexperience was.

How could he entrust her with the responsibility handed down by generations of Staffords, Coleridges and Blacks?

He’d put thoughts of Aimee aside. Concentrated on Nicolo Barbieri. The man had the intelligence, the courage, the experience to move SCB forward.

If only he carried the right blood, James had thought…

And the solution had come to him.

Barbieri was young. Thirty, thirty-two. Something like that. Aimee was in her midtwenties.

Once upon a time, nations had forged bonds through marriage. So had powerful institutions. Men and women had been joined in matrimony so they could produce children who carried the proud ancestry of both.

“Grandfather, I want an answer. Why is Nicolo Barbieri here?”

Black looked at the Italian prince, then at his headstrong American granddaughter.

“He is here,” he said calmly, “to make you his wife.”

Chapter Five

FOR A MOMENT, no one spoke. No one moved. Even the dust motes hovered in the silence.

Then Aimee collapsed into her chair and made a choked sound. Was she laughing? One glance at her and Nicolo knew she wasn’t. She looked the way he felt, as if an elephant had suddenly appeared in their midst.

“A bad joke, Grandfather. Now tell me the real reason.”

“That is the real reason.” James was unsmiling as he met her eyes. “You have some good ideas, Aimee, but you’re too inexperienced to run SCB.”

“I’m fully capable of running SCB. And in the event I needed advice, I’d turn to you.”

“If I could rely on lasting long enough to do that,” her grandfather said bluntly, “I wouldn’t be handing my company to someone else.”

“I’m not someone else. I’m your granddaughter!”

“You need guidance, Aimee.” The old man paused. “And you need a husband. A woman’s function is to marry and bear children.”

Fascinated, not yet believing what was happening, Nicolo sat back and became a silent observer.

“You’re a century behind the times, Grandfather.”

“So it would seem. Which is why I’m willing to see you as second-in-command to a man capable of running my company.”

“Second-in-command?” Aimee’s voice rose. “Do you actually think I’d agree to such an arrangement?”

“Stafford-Coleridge-Black needs strong, proven leadership. It also needs, as you have pointed out many times, new blood. His Highness can provide both those things.” Black fixed her with an autocratic eye. “He can also provide our bank with a new generation of leaders.”

A flush rose in her cheeks. “You speak as if—as if I’m a broodmare!”

“I speak sense, child,” Black said, somewhat more gently. “You know I do. This is the perfect solution to everything.”

A muscle knotted in Nicolo’s jaw as silence fell over the room again. The offhand comment about providing the bank with a new generation was, perhaps, the most infuriating of all the infuriating things the old man had said.

If he took Aimee Black to bed, breeding a future generation of bankers would not be the reason.

What about the night you spent with her, Nicolo? A man who doesn’t use a condom is a man flirting with fatherhood.

A knot formed in his belly. He’d never done such a foolhardy thing before, forgotten protection in the rush to take a woman, but then, he’d never done anything as crazy as making love to a stranger, either.

He looked at Aimee.

Nothing to worry about, he thought coldly. A woman who slept with a nameless man would be using protection of her own. She looked innocent now, in that demure outfit, tears glittering in her eyes, but it was all an act.

An act, he thought, and felt anger overtake surprise. What a pair they were, the old man and his granddaughter.

Did they really take him for such an easy mark?

Perhaps it was time to remind them of who he was.

“Excuse me,” he said, his voice dangerously soft, “but perhaps I might say a word…Or would that spoil this rather amusing little scene?”

“Your Highness.” James Black cleared his throat. “Maybe I should have mentioned this to you during an earlier meeting, but—”

“Indeed, signore. Maybe you should have.”

“I considered it, but—”

“But, you were afraid I’d laugh in your face.”

“I admit, I thought it possible you might see my idea as…unpalatable.”

The woman gave a soft moan, as if she’d only just remembered his presence. Nicely timed, Nicolo thought, and decided the game had gone on long enough.

“There is more than that possibility,” he said coldly, as he pushed back his chair. “There is that certainty.”

“Your Highness—”

“Yes,” Nicolo said through clenched teeth, “that is who I am. I am Prince Nicolo Antonius Barbieri, of a lineage much older and far more honorable than yours, and you would do well to remember it.”

Had he really said that? Dio, he had. And his speech was going from lightly accented to the way it had been when he’d first come to this country to attend university, thirteen years ago.

It was a measure of his rage, and rage was not a good thing. A man could only succeed when his emotions were under control.

Nicolo stood and wrapped his hands tightly around the top rung of his chair.

“You were right, Signore Black. I would have brought this bank the leadership it needs. And, someday, I will surely produce the sons who will succeed me.” He flashed a look at Aimee, whose cheeks were crimson.

Good, he thought with savage pleasure. It was a joy to see her humiliated.

“But I will do that with a woman of my choosing, who brings pride to my name and not dishonor.”

Aimee’s chair fell back as she scrambled to her feet and rounded the table to face him, head high, lips drawn back in a snarl.

“You—you no good, dissolute son of a bitch!”

“I am dissolute?” Nicolo let go of the chair and pounded his fist on the table. So much for self-control. “No, Miss Black. I hardly think it’s I who should bear that label.”

“You think, because you’re a man, you can keep to a different level of morality? Let me tell you something, Prince Whoever You Are—”

“Do not think to lecture me about morals, Miss Black. Not unless you want me to tell your grandfather about the night we spent together.” He paused, and his mouth twisted. “Or does he already know the salient details?”

All the color drained from her face. “What?”

“Your grandfather gives as good a performance as you. Not quite as enjoyable as the one you gave this spring, but still more than acceptable.”

James looked from one of them to the other. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“Of course you understand.” Nicolo gathered his papers together and stuffed them into his briefcase. “I am Italian. My people go back to the time of Caesar. My bloodlines flow with conspiracy.”

“What conspiracy?” Black sputtered.

“Which of you planned this?” A smile slashed across his face. “No matter. It comes to the same thing—though I admit, I choose to believe the added touch of seduction was the lady’s idea.”

“Don’t,” Aimee said, reaching out her hand. “I beg you. Don’t say anymore.”

“She and I would meet, seemingly by accident. I would find her coldness enticing.”

“Aimee? What is he talking about?”

“Then the sex. Incredible sex, but then, nothing less would do. And the coup de grâce. The disappearing act and the hope that I’d want more of what I had that night, enough so that when I learned the identity of my seductress, this little melodrama could be played for its full impact.” He looked at Aimee. “That was a nice touch, by the way, that ‘I’d never marry this man’ routine. My compliments. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have believed it.”

Her eyes, the color of pansies in the rain, pleaded with him to stop.

For one brief moment, he remembered how terrified she’d been when he followed her into the bathroom at Lucas’s club. How worried that someone would see them.

And he remembered what he had not permitted himself to remember until now, the way she’d trembled when he took her to his bed, the way she’d looked up at him when he made love to her, really made love to her, kissing her slowly, savoring her taste, taking all the time in the world to caress her and stroke her and, at last, enter her, how her face, her whispers, her caresses had told him that what she was feeling, what he was making her feel, was new and incredible and had never happened to her before.

Liar, Nicolo thought, and anger became rage so fierce it slammed into him like a fist.

“Wasted effort,” he said roughly. “You understand, Black? I’m not interested in you or your bank or your slut of a granddaughter.”

Aimee whipped her hand through the air and slammed it against his jaw. Nicolo grabbed her wrist and put enough pressure on it to make her yelp.

“Don’t,” he said, his voice soft with malice. “Do you hear me? Don’t do anything you will regret.”

“I couldn’t regret anything more than being with you that horrid night!”

She was shaking now, her eyes glistening with hatred for him. That was fine. Let her hate him. God knew, he hated her and the despicable old man who sat watching them.

James Black was sick, all right, but it had nothing to do with his stroke. His sickness was moral depravity.

The old man loved his damnable bank more than his granddaughter, who he’d sent to seduce him.

The night had been a travesty of passion. All of it. The deep kisses. The sighs. The way she’d framed his face with her hands and brought his mouth to hers while her dark-gold hair spread in abandon over his pillow.

Cursing, Nicolo reached for her now, dragged her to her toes and crushed her mouth beneath his. She cried out and it only made him more furious, hearing the cry, remembering how differently she had cried out in his arms that night.

The old man said something in a sharp voice. Nicolo ignored him. He went on kissing Aimee Black until her cry became a moan, until her mouth softened and clung to his.

Then he flung her from him, grabbed his briefcase and strode from the room.

Amazing, what an hour in a quiet place could do for a man’s disposition.

An hour—and three bourbons, straight up.

Nicolo looked at the half inch of amber liquid that remained in his glass, sighed and pushed it away.

He was much calmer. Still furious at the Blacks and the ugly game he’d been dragged into, but at least he had regained his equilibrium.

What he needed now was coffee, perhaps a bite to eat. Then he’d go to his hotel, phone his pilot, have him ready the Learjet.

A few hours, and he’d be home.

Goodbye, New York. Goodbye, James Black. Goodbye, acquisition of Stafford-Coleridge-Black.

He could live without all of them. The city, the crazy old man, the bank.

There were other private banks in the United States, maybe not quite as suitable for his purposes, but they would do. He still had the short-list from which he’d ultimately chosen SCB. As soon as he returned to Rome, he’d tell his people to begin researching them in depth all over again.

It wasn’t as if he’d fixated on this one financial institution…

As if he’d fixated on this one beautiful woman.

A lying, scheming, bitch of an immoral woman.

And, damn it, he didn’t know why what had happened should have made him react with such rage.

The bartender caught his eye. Did he want another drink? Nicolo shook his head, then mouthed the word, coffee. The guy nodded.

He’d been around long enough to know that the days of the old robber barons were not over. Scandals in the world of high finance erupted as frequently as squalls over the Mediterranean. Seemingly intelligent men did amazingly stupid things to advance their own interests.

James Black was no different.

Neither was his granddaughter, who had been willing to sleep with a stranger to whet his appetite for a dynastic merger.

“Your coffee, sir.”

Nicolo looked up. “Grazie.”

“Will there be anything else?”

“Si.” What was with all this Italian? When in Rome…or, in this case, New York…“Yes,” he said. “A sandwich.”

“What kind would you like?”

“Anything. Roast beef is fine.” He smiled. “Something to keep the bourbon company, si?”

More Italian, he thought as the bartender moved off. A clear sign he was still distressed, though surely not anywhere near as much as before. The whiskey, now some much-needed logic, were working their magic.

The simple fact was that Black was a man who would do whatever was necessary to get what he wanted.

So would his granddaughter.

Nicolo drank some coffee.

And, really, how different did that make her from some other women he’d known? Women who dressed in a way meant to gain a man’s interest. Who went to bed with a man and performed whatever tricks they imagined might win them points. Who lied to a man’s face, promised love and devotion forever, all in hopes of landing a suitable husband.

Of all the women he’d known, Aimee Black was the last woman in the world he would ever consider marrying. Her morals were lacking and it wasn’t because she’d slept with him that night.

It was because she’d done it as part of an act.

Nicolo took another mouthful of coffee.

Maybe his ego demanded it. Maybe his male pride required it. Whatever the reason, he’d wanted to believe that the woman with the violet eyes had felt the same uncontrollable hunger he had felt. That she could no more have kept from making love with him than she could have stopped breathing.

That what had happened that night was the most exciting memory of her life, and that they had created that memory with equal passion and desire.

He could see her now, that night in his bed. Eyes dark with pleasure. Skin fragrant with her need…

“Your sandwich, sir.”

Nicolo blinked. Had he ordered a sandwich?

“Would you like anything else? More coffee?”

Nicolo pushed the plate aside, rose to his feet and dropped a hundred-dollar bill on the table.

“No,” he said brusquely, and added what he hoped was a polite smile and a hurried, “Grazie.”

It wasn’t the bartender’s fault that what he wanted, what he damned well would not be denied, could not be found in this bar.

Aimee sat slumped on the sofa in her apartment, face buried in her hands.

Her anger was gone, replaced by a terrible emptiness in her heart.

“Let me explain,” Grandfather had said.

Explain what? That he’d been willing to sell her to a foreigner to get what he wanted for his precious bank?

She’d fled his office, ignored his voice calling after her, stumbled into a taxi and gone home.

She’d never harbored any illusions about her grandfather’s feelings for her. His lack of feelings, she amended, with a bitter smile. She’d accepted it.

What other choice did she have?

He’d taken her in after she’d lost her parents. He’d raised her, or maybe it was more accurate to say he’d paid a series of nannies and housekeepers to raise her. He’d sent her to the best schools; he’d seen to it she had tennis and skiing and riding lessons, all the things his fortune could buy.

But he’d never really loved her.

What he loved was his bank and the dead Staffords, Coleridges and Blacks who’d founded it. Everything else, including her, was secondary.

Even so, she’d never dreamed him capable of such a cold-blooded scheme. That he’d want to marry her off to a stranger…

Except, Nicolo Barbieri—Prince Barbieri—was not a stranger. He was the man she’d made love with endless times in a few short hours.

How could she have done that? Climaxed in his arms when she hadn’t even known his name?

Nausea roiled in her belly. Aimee clamped her hand to her mouth, raced to the bathroom and reached it just in time. A couple of moments later, pale and shaken, she flushed the commode and sank down on the closed seat.

God, she felt awful. She was tired of throwing up, tired of just plain feeling tired.

This time, at least she had a reason for feeling so rotten. Who wouldn’t, after today?

That son of a bitch. Prince Barbieri. Prince of Darkness, was more like it. To call her a—a—

She couldn’t even think the word.

How could he believe she’d deliberately seduced him? Offered herself as bait for her grandfather’s vile proposition?

She’d slept with Nicolo Barbieri because—because she’d been upset. Anxious. Stressed.

Aimee groaned and put her face in her hands again.

She’d slept with him because she’d wanted to. Because he was the most exciting man she’d ever seen and because she’d fantasized about him all that afternoon.

That was why she’d refused to exchange names.

To make what had happened real would have meant despising herself for what she’d let him do…

And ever since that night, she’d wanted him to do it all again.

No wonder he’d looked at her with such loathing today. She loathed herself. But to believe she’d deliberately—

The ringing of the phone made her jump.

She didn’t want to talk to anybody. Especially her grandfather and that was probably him calling. He was furious at her. She’d walked out of his office without a word, ignored his demand that she come back.

Let the answering machine deal with him. She wasn’t going to.

Another ring. Then the machine picked up.

Hi. You’ve reached 555-6145. Please leave a message after the tone.

“Ms. Black, this is Dr. Glassman’s office. Your test results are in. Please call our office between the hours of eight and—”

She ran for the phone, snatched it up. “I’m here! I mean, this is Ms. Black.”

“Ms. Black? Please hold for the doctor.”

Aimee held, imagining the worst. Why not, on a day like this? A brain tumor. A rare blood malady. Or—her breath caught at how stupid she was not to have thought of it sooner.

Or an illness of the kind people got these days, from having unprotected sex.

No. Not that.

Whatever else he was, she could not imagine the Prince of Darkness having that kind of disease.

“Ms. Black? Dr. Glassman here…”

Aimee listened. And listened. Then she put down the phone and stared blankly at the wall.

She’d thought right.

Nicolo Barbieri hadn’t give her a disease.

He’d given her a baby.

She sat motionless for hours, wrapped in her robe, oblivious to the passage of time.

What to do? What to do?

She was single. Unemployed. Living on temporary jobs because she refused to let her grandfather support her.

No money, no prospects, this small apartment in a not-very-good neighborhood…

This time, it wasn’t the phone that beat shrilly against the silence, it was the doorbell.

Aimee ignored it. Whoever it was would go away. The UPS man with a package, the super to drill a peephole in the door, something she’d been requesting for months.

The bell rang again. And again. Whoever was out there was persistent.

Aimee sighed, rose to her feet and went to the door. She undid the locks. The chain. Cracked the door an inch…

And felt the blood drain from her head.

“No,” she said. “No—”

“Yes,” Nicolo growled, and just as he had that fateful night, he put his shoulder to the door and forced it open.

Chapter Six

THEY SAID TIME defused anger.

The hell it did.

In the thirty or forty minutes Nicolo had spent looking up Aimee Black in the telephone directory, then taking a taxi all the way downtown, through the tangled snarl of midmorning traffic, his anger didn’t cool one bit.

If anything, it changed to something so hot and fierce he could damned near feel it inside him.

It was bad enough she’d been part of the ugly scam her grandfather had designed. If the actual seduction wasn’t part of it, at least the come-on was.

What was worse was that she’d kept lying to him, not only that night but again this morning.

She had intended to entice him. He was certain of that. Now, she’d lied about what she’d felt in his arms. She hadn’t intended to get caught up in her own game, but she had.

He was certain of it.

He knew women. The little things they did when they wanted to boost a man’s ego. The things they did when their passion was real.

What Aimee felt had been real.

The throaty little moans. The soft cries. The lift of her hips to his. Real. All of it. So real, he knew he’d never forget anything they had done together.

And he was damned well going to force her to admit it. She might have come on to him deliberately but after the first few minutes in his arms, everything had changed.

Aimee had followed where he led, all the way to ecstasy.

Dio, just thinking about it was making him hard, and if that wasn’t ridiculous, he didn’t know what was. He was a man who had his pick of women and even the occasional ones who started by pretending his touch drove them crazy soon forgot to pretend.

There were half a dozen women waiting for his return to Rome. One phone call, he’d have whichever of them he wanted ready to welcome him into her bed.

But he would be less a man if he didn’t end this in a way that made it clear who was the victor, not just by walking out on the deal James Black had engineered but by forcing the old man’s accomplice-in-crime to admit that what she’d felt in his arms had been real.

It was the penalty she’d pay for her duplicity.

Nobody lied to Nicolo Barbieri and got away with it, especially not a woman who had haunted his days and nights for three entire months.

The cab pulled up in front of a tired-looking, five-story tenement. James Black’s granddaughter, Saturday night’s party girl, lived here?

Maybe he had the address wrong.

There was only one way to find out.

Nicolo handed the cabbie a bill and told him to wait. Then he climbed the grimy steps to the front door. An unlocked front door.

Not a good idea in a neighborhood like this, but how Aimee lived was not his problem.

The door opened on a small vestibule, thick with the faint but unmistakable odor of beer and other, less palatable things. The only signs of life were the mailboxes set into a stained gray wall.

Nicolo scanned the nameplates. A. Black lived in apartment 5C.

The door that opened into the house itself had no lock, either. None that was usable, anyway. Ahead, a dimly lit staircase with time-worn treads rose into the gloom.

Nicolo started up.

By the time he reached the fifth floor and apartment 5C, he was almost hoping he’d come to the wrong place. This was the kind of building that epitomized the things people tried to avoid when they lived in Manhattan.

So what? he told himself again. How Black’s granddaughter lived was her affair.

He hesitated. Had coming here actually been a good idea? What would he gain by forcing her to admit she’d enjoyed what they’d done together? Was his ego that fragile, that it needed affirmation from a woman like this?

Before he could change his mind, Nicolo pressed the bell button.

Nobody answered.

He rang again. And then again. Okay. He’d come here, she wasn’t home. That is, she wasn’t home if he even had the correct address, which he doubted…

The door swung open. Not far, just a couple of inches, but enough for him to see the woman who’d opened it.

Aimee.

She stared at him. Her eyes widened. “No,” she whispered, “no…”

What would come next was in those wide eyes. Besides, they had done this dance before.

She started to slam the door but Nicolo was too quick. She cried out and fell back as he put his shoulder to the door and forced it open. A second later, he was inside a tiny foyer.

Aimee was pressed against the wall, looking up at him with fear in her eyes.

He felt a tightening in his gut.

She hadn’t been afraid of him that night…But this wasn’t that night. It was good that she was afraid. Hell, it was what he wanted. When he was done with her…

“No,” she said again, her voice high and thin.

Her eyes rolled up. She collapsed as if she were a marionette and someone had cut her strings.

Nicolo caught her before she crumpled to the floor. It was an automatic move but he knew damned well the faint was simply another outstanding performance…

Merda. His heart skipped a beat. It was not an act. She was limp in his arms.

He looked around frantically, saw a small sofa and carried her to it. “Ms. Black. Aimee. Can you hear me?”

Stupido! Of course she couldn’t hear him. She was unconscious. What did you do for an unconscious woman?

Cold compresses. And spirits of—of what? Ammonia? Who in hell had spirits of ammonia lying around in this day and age?

A doorway opened onto a kitchen. Nicolo hurried inside, grabbed a towel from the sink, stuffed it with ice cubes from the fridge’s freezer tray and ran back into the living room.

Aimee lay as he’d left her, small and unmoving, her pulse beat visible in her slender throat.

“Aimee,” he said softly.

She didn’t respond. Nicolo knelt beside her. Slipped his arm around her shoulders and lifted her to him.

“Aimee,” he said again, and gently placed the ice pack against her forehead.

After a moment, she groaned.

“That’s it, cara. Come on. Look at me. Open your eyes and look at me.”

Her lashes fluttered but her lids stayed down. Nicolo drew her closer. Held her against him, eased her silky curls from the back of her neck and ran the ice pack lightly over the nape.

She moaned softly, her breath warm against his throat.

He closed his eyes.

He had forgotten what it was like to hold her. The delicacy of her bones. The floral scent of her hair. The unblemished softness of her skin.

His arms tightened around her. “Aimee,” he whispered.

Suddenly he held a wildcat in his arms. She pulled back, curled her hands into fists and pounded them against his shoulders.

“Get away from me!”

“Aimee! Stop it!”

“What are you doing here?” Her voice shook. “Get out. Do you hear me? Get out!”

Nicolo grabbed her wrists in one hand. “Damn it, you fainted! Would you rather I’d left you lying on the floor?”

“I’d rather never see your face again!”

His mouth thinned. He let go of her and rose to his feet.

“My sentiments, exactly, Ms. Black. Where is your telephone?”

“What do you want with the telephone?”

“I’m going to phone for an ambulance. Then it will be my pleasure to walk out that door and not look back.”

“No!” Aimee sat up quickly. Too quickly; the room seemed to give a sickening lurch and the all-too-familiar nausea sent a rush of bile up her throat. “I don’t—I don’t need an—”

“Dio, look at you! You’re white as a ghost.”

“I am fine,” she said carefully, as she rose to her feet. The room tilted again. She took a deep breath, then slowly let it out. “Thank you for your help, Prince Barbieri. Now, get the hell out of my apartment.”

“Not until I know you’re all right.”

“Why would you give a damn?”

“Why? Well, let’s see. I rang the bell. You opened the door, saw me and did an excellent imitation of a Victorian swoon.” His smile was lupine and all teeth. “I’m sure you’ll forgive me if I tell you I can envision a scenario in which you end up accusing me of somehow causing that swoon.”

He meant it as an insult, she knew, but Aimee could only think how close to the truth he’d come.

“I just thanked you for your help, didn’t I?”

“You’re a superb liar,” Nicolo said coldly. “Or did you think I’d forget that?”

“We’ve been all through this.”

“Yes. We have. And you lied.” His eyes narrowed as they met hers. “You told your grandfather I seduced you when we both know that what happened in that club, and in my hotel room, was by mutual consent.”

Aimee stared up at him. His face might have been the stone face of a Roman emperor, his eyes unseeing and unfeeling. It was impossible to imagine she’d slept with this man.

He was, indeed, a stranger.

“Is that why you came here? To hear me admit that I—that I let you seduce me?”

“That you let me seduce you?” Nicolo folded his arms and gave a hollow laugh. “Such clever phrasing.”

Aimee’s legs were like rubber. She’d never fainted before but she thought she might damned well do it again if she had to keep up a conversation with this arrogant ass who was in a snit because he believed she’d come on to him deliberately.

She could only imagine how he’d react if he knew she carried a baby.

His baby.

A choked laugh caught in her throat. Prince Nicolo Barbieri’s child. He wouldn’t believe it. Well, who could blame him? She could hardly believe it, either.

She couldn’t be pregnant. She took the pill. She’d been taking it for a couple of years now, not to prevent getting pregnant. Why would she, considering that the last time she’d been intimate with a man before she’d slept with Nicolo Barbieri was her senior year at college?

She took it to regulate her period, but what had happened to its primary function as a contraceptive?

Accidents happen. She could almost hear the tut-tutting voice of her boarding school’s sex-ed teacher. Remember, ladies, accidents happen.

Her legs buckled.

“Dio!” Nicolo grabbed her shoulders as she collapsed on the sofa. “That’s it. You need a doctor.”

“I need you to go away.” Aimee struggled up against the pillows as he took his cell phone from his pocket. “What are you doing?”

“Calling for an ambulance.”

“No! I don’t want an ambulance. Damn you, will you just—”

“Then tell me your physician’s number.”

Her physician’s number. The man who’d made her pregnant wanted to call the doctor who’d just told her about that pregnancy. Wild laughter rose in her throat.

“You find this amusing?”

“No. Not amusing. Just—just…”

Aimee shook her head. The only thing she wanted was to bury her face in her hands and weep. That meant getting Nicolo Barbieri out of her apartment and out of her life.

Time to ditch her stupid pride.

“You came here to hear me admit that—that what happened between us was as much my idea as yours.” She paused, touched the tip of her tongue to her dry lips. “All right. I admit it. I’m equally responsible for what happened.” She shuddered and drew the lapels of her robe together. “I behaved irresponsibly. But not like—like what you called me. There was no plan. No orchestration. There was just—there was just you, and me, and some kind of insanity…”

Her voice faded away but she had said enough. Nicolo had what he’d come for: her admission that she’d wanted him as much as he’d wanted her.

The rest didn’t matter. He knew that now.

He no longer gave a damn whose idea the meeting had been, hers or the old man. What mattered was that once he’d kissed her, once he’d touched her, she had belonged to him.

“Please. Go away now. I—I’m tired. I want to lie down.”

His brow furrowed. She was more than tired. She looked…What? Ill? Frightened?

Terrified.

Of him? That was what he’d wanted, wasn’t it? That she be afraid of him? And yet—and yet, suddenly, he wanted something more. Something just out of reach…

“Aimee.” Nicolo squatted beside her and took her hands in his. Her fingers were ice-cold. “Cara. You need a doctor.”

“No.” She shook her head; the lustrous honey curls shifted like strands of heavy silk around her pale face. “I don’t. Really. I’m fine.”

Plainly, something was wrong. She needed help. He wanted to grab her and shake some sense into her.

Or take her in his arms and kiss her. Tell her she had nothing to fear, not from him. Not from anything, as long as he was here to protect her…

Dio, was he losing his mind?

Nicolo shot to his feet. “Tea,” he said briskly.

She looked up at him as if he’d lost his sanity. Perhaps he had but she wouldn’t let him call a doctor and he’d be damned if he’d leave her when she looked like a ghost.

“Tea cures everything, or so my great-grandmother used to say.”

Aimee didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. He was human after all. He had to be, if he’d had a great-grandmother.

She stood up. He reached out a steadying hand but she ignored it.

“Thank you for the suggestion,” she said politely. “I’ll make myself a cup of tea as soon as you—What?”

“I will make the tea.”

He would make the tea. Aimee bit back another wave of what she knew was hysterical laughter.

This arrogant prince, this stranger who’d fathered the collection of cells in her womb, would make the tea.

That’s all they were, at this point, weren’t they? Just cells?

“You will drink some tea, and then I will leave.” He smiled. “Agreed?”

His mood had changed. He’d gone from threatening to charming, and she knew the reason. It was because he’d gotten his way. He’d wrung a humiliating admission from her.

Oh, but his smile was devastating.

Maybe the realization showed in her face, because he moved closer and looked at her through eyes gone as dark as the sea.

“Aimee.” His hands framed her face. “I’m sorry if I frightened you.”

“You don’t have to explain.”

He shook his head, lay a finger lightly over her mouth.

“I was angry. At you. At your grandfather.” He took a breath. “At myself, for wanting you so badly that night.”

“Please—”

“I never wanted a woman as I wanted you.” His voice roughened. “I think I might have died if you had turned me away.”

What did a woman say to such an admission? That she’d have died, too, if he hadn’t made love to her? That he’d made her feel things she’d never imagined? That she’d never forget that night in his arms?

All true—and now she carried his baby. For one moment, she’d forgotten that.

Aimee took a quick step back.

“The kettle’s on the stove. The tea’s in the cupboard over the sink. I’ll—I’ll just—I’ll just go and wash my face…”

“Damn it, we have to talk about that night! You can’t keep pretending it didn’t happen.”

Aimee shook her head, turned and fled. Just as she had that night, Nicolo thought, and thought, too, of what had happened when he caught her.

It would be the same now. All he had to was go after her…

“Damn it!”

He swung away, marched into the kitchen and grabbed the kettle. She had fainted. She was ill. What kind of animal was he to think of sex now?

Besides, he wasn’t interested in getting involved with Aimee Black. As beautiful as she was, as much as he might want to make love to her, he’d never fully trust her.

No matter what she claimed, he would always see James Black’s hand in all that had—

The telephone rang.

Nicolo glanced toward the bathroom. The door was still closed; he could hear the sound of water running.

The phone rang again. Should he take the call? No. Surely she had voice mail…

Click.

Hi. You’ve reached 555-6145. Please leave a message after the tone.

A short metallic ring. Then a voice.

Hi, Ms. Black, this is Sarah from Dr. Glassman’s office.

Nicolo put down the kettle. He knew he shouldn’t listen to a private message but what was he supposed to do? Put his hands over his ears? Besides, this was from a physician.

Now, perhaps, he’d know why Aimee had fainted.

…vitamins. And iron. I meant to tell you that when we spoke earlier. Also, the doctor thought you might want a recommendation for an OB-GYN…

An OB-GYN? What in hell was that?

…absolutely fine, but it’s always a good idea to start with an obstetrician early in your pregnancy and, of course, you’re already in your third month…

The floor tilted under Nicolo’s feet. Pregnant? Three months pregnant? What did it mean? What in hell did it mean that a woman he’d had sex with three months ago was—

Aimee flew past him and slapped the machine to silence. Her face had gone from white to red.

“Get out,” she said. Her voice trembled as she pointed her finger at the door. “Damn it, Barbieri, do you hear me? Get out! Get out! Get—”

And with cold, relentless clarity, Nicolo knew. He knew exactly what it meant.

He had put a child in Aimee Black’s belly.

Chapter Seven

AIMEE TRIED to tell herself this was all a bad dream.

Any second, she’d wake up, safe and in bed.

No phone messages from a receptionist who didn’t understand the meaning of privacy. No Nicolo Barbieri staring at her like a man who’d just seen his life flash before his eyes.

Most of all, God, most of all, no baby growing inside her belly.

But it wasn’t a dream.

Everything that was happening was hideously real, from the red light blinking with impersonal determination on her answering machine to the man standing in her tiny kitchen, dwarfing it with his size.

With his fury.

As if he had anything to be furious about.

It was she who was pregnant, she who would agonize over the life-changing decisions ahead, she who would pay the price for one night’s madness.

Male and female. Yin and yang. Poets made the balance sound romantic but it wasn’t. Men led. Women followed. That was what the world expected, and what too many women accepted.

She’d always known that. She’d watched her father treat her mother like an amusing, if sometimes trying, possession.

Her grandfather had done his best to deal with her the same way but she hadn’t permitted it. She’d never permitted it…

Until the night she fell into the arms of this stranger who stood watching her through accusing eyes.

At least she had herself under better control now. She took a steadying breath—there was no point in letting him see how upset she was—and looked straight back at him.

“Goodbye, Prince Barbieri.”

It was like speaking to a statue. “Explain yourself,” he growled.

Explain herself? The cold demand chased away whatever remained of her nerves.

She didn’t need to explain herself to anyone.

“It’s a small apartment,” she said evenly. “Do you really need me to explain how to get to the front door?”

Her attempt at sarcasm backfired. The look on his face grew even colder.

“That call.”

“That private call, you mean.”

That, too, got her nowhere. “You are pregnant,” he said flatly.

Aimee said nothing. Nicolo took a step toward her.

“Answer me!”

“You didn’t ask a question.”

His eyes narrowed. “I warn you, this is not a time for games.” He jerked his head toward the telephone. “That message. Does it mean you are with child?”

Such an old-fashioned phrase. Another time, she might have found it charming. Now, she found it a measure of how much Nicolo Barbieri belonged in a world that was as far from her own as Earth was from the moon.

“That message was for me. I have no intention of discussing it with—”

He was on her before she could finish the sentence, his hands hard on her elbows as he lifted her to her toes.

“You are three months pregnant!” His grasp on her tightened. “Three months ago, you slept with me.”

“I told you, I am not going to discuss this!”

“You will discuss whatever I wish, when it concerns me.” He lowered his head until his eyes were on the same level as hers. “How many other men were you with three months ago?”

Oh, how she hated him! And yet, he had every right to think that way about her. She’d gone into his bed with no more planning than the slut he’d called her. With less planning, she thought, or she wouldn’t be pregnant!

“I asked you a question.”

“And I told you to get out.” Aimee’s voice trembled; she hated herself for the show of weakness. “You have no right—”

“You will answer me! How many others were there?”

She wrenched free of his hands. “A hundred. A thousand. Ten thousand! Are you satisfied?!”

The expression on his face was terrifying. She didn’t care. Let him think whatever he liked. Let him think anything, so long as he went away and left her alone.

“I assume,” he said, his voice clipped, “that is an exaggeration. Still, all things considered, do you actually know who the father is?”

She’d asked for the insult by her behavior that night and by her answer a moment ago. Still, it took all her control not to launch herself at him and claw out his eyes.

“Whoever it is, it isn’t your problem.”

“That is not an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re going to—”

He caught her again, pulled her roughly into his arms and kissed her savagely.

“Does that shake your memory, Aimee? Does it remind you that I have every right to demand answers—or have you forgotten I spent half the night spending myself inside you three months ago?”

Her face flamed. “I hate you,” she said, struggling against his iron grip. “You’re a bully. You’re disgusting. You’re—”

He kissed her again, harder than before, his lips, his teeth, his hands all a harsh reminder of his power.

“I am all that and more. Now answer the question. Who fathered the child you carry? Was it me?”

Her mind raced. All she had to do was say no. That would be the end of it.

And yet, how could she?

She didn’t care about lying to Nicolo. But lying to the tiny life within her…

There was something terrible in that.

She knew thinking that way was crazy but everything that had happened today was crazy. Why not this, too?

Besides, the truth wouldn’t change anything. This was her responsibility. She wasn’t naïve; she knew how these things went. In school and then here in the city, she’d known women who’d been in the same fix. Things always ended the same way. The men denied being responsible. Or, if confronted by irrefutable proof, made some kind of settlement to avoid a nasty legal action and then went on with their lives.

The women ended up making decisions that would affect them forever. Abortion. Adoption. Single-mother-hood. Choose the one you hoped would be best for you, for your baby, then live with it.

This would be no different. Considering that Nicolo hadn’t already run out the door, his solution to the problem was surely going to be money.

Not that she gave a damn.

She was not weak. She could handle this on her own, and to hell with Nicolo Barbieri.

The sooner he understood that, the better.

“Is this baby mine?” he demanded.

Aimee looked up in defiance. “You’re goddamned right it is.”

Except for the almost-painful tightening of his hands on her flesh, he showed no emotion.

“You are certain?”

An ugly question, but she didn’t flinch. “Absolutely.”

“There was no one else who could have—”

“No.”

“Because, I promise you, Aimee, I will demand blood tests.”

“What you’d want is a DNA test,” she said coldly. “They’re a much more reliable proof of paternity, according to a law class I took in college.” She smiled thinly. “But bothering with the test would be a waste of time.”

His lips drew back from his teeth in what might have been an attempt at a smile.

“That decision will be mine. It will not be yours.”

His accent was growing more and more pronounced. She’d already figured out that was a sure sign he was having trouble controlling his temper.

Too bad.

She had a temper, too. And there was a limit to how many insults a woman, even an imprudent one, had to take.

“Believe me, Prince Barbieri. I’ve only done a few foolish things in my life.” Aimee jerked free of his hands. “And going to bed with you rates as number one.”

His face darkened. “Insulting me at a time like this is not wise.”

“Then don’t insult me by calling me a liar! You asked the question. I answered it. Unfortunately you don’t like the answer, but that doesn’t change that fact that it was you who made me pregnant.”

“I made you pregnant.” His words were filled with soft malice. “Such an interesting way to phrase what happened that night, cara.”

She felt the heat rise in her cheeks. “What happened was that I’d had too much to drink.”

“I don’t recall you having anything to drink.”

His assessment was closer to the mark than hers. She’d had one drink. Actually, a couple of sips of one drink, but she wasn’t going to be sidetracked into a discussion of why she’d had sex with him when she didn’t understand it herself.

“The point is, you impregnated me.”

“Now you describe a laboratory experiment.” He moved toward her slowly, gaze locked to hers, and though she hated herself for it, she took a step back. “But that was not what happened in that bathroom or in my bed.”

“There is no reason to have this conversation.”

“Ah, but there is.” He was a breath away now, his eyes glittering with heat as her shoulders hit the wall. “I think you need reminding of what we did that night.”

“I have all the reminding I need.”

“Si. So it would seem. My child in your womb.” His gaze flattened. “Was this part of the great plan?”

Aimee blinked. “What?”

“Such an innocent face, cara.” His mouth twisted with derision. “And such a devious scheme. The clever meeting on the street. The coincidental meeting at the club. The seduction.” He cupped her face, raised it to his until the midnight-blue of his eyes filled her vision. “And now, this. An heir to your grandfather’s kingdom. A child of my blood from the womb of a Stafford-Coleridge-Black descendant.” His gaze darkened. “Such an amazing set of coincidences.”

“You are,” Aimee whispered shakily, “an evil man.”

“I am a logical man. One who assumed you were using protection.”

“I was. It failed.”

“How convenient it failed when failure was most necessary.”

Her eyes filled with angry tears. “I despise you!”

“That really breaks my heart, cara.”

“When I think that—that I let you touch me—”

“You let me touch you?” Nicolo gave a sharp bark of laughter. “You begged me to touch you. I remember every word. Every whisper.”

“I must have been out of my mind.”

Aimee’s face was white with exhaustion. Clearly this was taking its toll and, just for a second, Nicolo’s anger lessened.

She was pregnant. And she had been so ill just a short while ago…

So what? he thought coldly.

She had brought it all on herself. Did she really expect him to believe her birth control protection had failed? A woman like her…Surely she would know all about such things.

And what about you?

The thought whispered its way from the depths of his conscience. He had to admit, it was a fair question.

He had taken Aimee without a condom. And he always used a condom, even if a woman said it wasn’t necessary.

Perhaps he was old-fashioned but protection was a man’s responsibility, especially in today’s sometimes ugly world.

So, what had become of his sense of responsibility that night?

It had flown out the window along with the ability to think with his brain instead of his body.

He’d wanted Aimee more than he’d ever wanted a woman in his life. Dio, he was getting hard, just remembering.

Nicolo cursed, spun away from her and paced across her kitchen. He ran his hands through his hair and told himself he was crazy.

His entire world had been upended and he was thinking about what it had been like to make love to a woman who was a stranger to him in every way that mattered.

What he had to think about was not that. It was what he should do next.

Should he contact his attorney? Demand to speak with her physician? What were his financial responsibilities, now and in the future?

Whenever an acquaintance married and had a child, he’d think, yes, I suppose I shall have a son, too, sometime in the future. Perhaps because his father had hardly ever been around when he was growing up, being a parent had never seemed anything more than a vague idea.

Now, it was fast becoming reality, assuming a lab test said Aimee Black was telling the truth. Assuming she wanted to remain pregnant.

Nicolo’s jaw tightened.

That would, of course, be her decision.

But it was a great deal to take in all at once. A child. His child. In the womb of a woman who had stirred him so that he’d forgotten everything he’d ever known about self-control.

To hell with that. Angry at Aimee, angry at himself, he swung toward her again.

“I assume you’ve made plans.”

“They don’t concern you.”

“What are those plans?”

“I just said—”

“Whatever you do, you will need proper care.”

“Didn’t you hear me? What I do is not your concern.”

“The message from your doctor. I gather he found you well.”

“She found me well,” Aimee said, with a lift of her chin.

Could a man laugh at such a moment? Nicolo found that at least he could smile.

“I stand corrected. And this—this OP?”

“OB-GYN. And we’re not going to have this conversation.”

“This is a specialist?”

“Damn it, Barbieri—”

“I see I am no longer that magnificent creature, the prince,” he said dryly.

“You are an intruder. And I want you to out of my home immediately.”

“What is this OB-GYN?”

“An obstetrician. Must I phone the police to get rid of you?”

“And tell them what, cara? That it annoys you to discuss your pregnancy with the man responsible for it?” He flashed a thin smile. “I suspect the officers who respond to your call would enjoy something to lighten their day.”

“Nicolo.” Her voice was weary. “Why are you doing this?”

He strode to her and cupped her elbows. “I am doing it,” he said sharply, “because you claim my child lies in your belly.”

“You asked for the truth. Don’t blame me if…” Aimee gasped and tried to catch his hands. “What are you doing?”

“Opening your robe,” he said calmly, as he undid the sash. “I want to see this pregnancy of yours.”

“I told you, it’s not…” Her breath caught as he spread the lapels of her robe wide. “Damn you, Nicolo—”

“It is my right,” he said coldly.

It was. Wasn’t it? The right of a man to see the body of a woman who claimed she carried his baby?

Dio, he had almost forgotten how beautiful she was.

The night they met, she’d worn something wickedly sexy under that incredible crimson dress. A black bra. A black thong. Both silky and small enough to hold in the palm of his hand.

Now, she wore sensible white cotton. A bra and panties. And it didn’t matter. She had the kind of body that didn’t need black silk to make it sexy.

Was it too soon to see the changes his child would bring? Her belly was still flat. Her breasts…were they already a little fuller?

“Nicolo.” Her voice was husky. “Nicolo…”

“I’m just curious, cara.” His voice was husky, too. And rough. As rough as the sudden pounding of his heart. He reached out, placed his hand over her belly again. “Still flat,” he said, as if it didn’t matter that he could feel the heat of her skin through the plain white cotton panties.

“Nicolo.”

He looked up, his eyes dark as they met hers. She was trembling; her lips were slightly parted and he remembered how they had parted for him that night. How greedily he had tasted her mouth. Her ineffable sweetness.

“What of your breasts?” he said in a low voice. Eyes locked to hers, he cupped one delicate mound of flesh. She gave a little moan; her eyes went from violet to black. “Have they changed yet?”

He felt her nipple engorge behind the cotton of her bra. She moaned again as he moved his thumb across the swollen tip and he knew he could have her. Take her again and again, until he’d rid himself of this need to possess her…

Dio, perhaps he had lost his mind! Quickly he stepped back.

“So,” he said briskly, as if nothing had happened, “we must discuss what to do next. What is right.”

Aimee pulled her robe together. She was shaken; he could see it, but he could see that she wasn’t going to admit it.

“What is right,” she said, “is for you to get out of my life.”

“I intend to as soon as we settle this.”

“It’s settled. This is my problem and I’ll decide what’s right.”

Nicolo nodded, but was that correct? Was the choice solely hers? What did a man do at a time like this? He’d never had to make the decision but he knew the obvious answers.

The trouble was that the obvious answers didn’t apply when you were the man involved in actually making the decision.

And what a hell of a decision this was.

He had made Aimee Black pregnant. Forget the nonsense about other men. He had always trusted his gut instinct in business; he trusted it now. He would own up to his responsibility, financially.

That was his decision.

What she did after that was hers.

Nicolo reached into his pocket, took out his checkbook and a gold pen.

“I don’t want your money!”

He looked up. Aimee was watching him, her eyes almost feverish in her pale face.

“You said you will do whatever is right. And so shall I.” He uncapped the pen. “Five hundred thousand. Will that be—”

“Five hundred thousand dollars?”

His eyebrows rose. “Is it not enough?”

Aimee flew at him and slapped the checkbook and pen from his hand. “Get out,” she growled. “Get out, get out, get—”

“Damn it,” Nicolo snarled, grabbing her wrists before she could slug him, “are you insane?”

“Do you think your money can change what’s happened? That it can buy back my dignity?” Tears of anger rose in her eyes to glitter like jewels on her lashes. “I don’t want your money, Nicolo. I don’t want anything from you except your promise that I’ll never see your face again!”

Her tears fell on his hand like the rain that had fallen on them both the day they’d met.

He suspected he would never forget that meeting, or Aimee.

Her defiance. Her passion. Her determination.

An inadvertent smile lifted the corner of his mouth. If ever a man wanted sons—even daughters—Aimee would be the woman to bear them. Such fire. Such courage…

His breath caught.

Suddenly he knew what was right. How had it taken him this long to see it?

He let go of Aimee’s hands. Then he picked up his checkbook, retrieved his pen, put them both back in his pocket. A roll of paper towels hung over the kitchen sink. He tore off half a dozen sheets and held them out to her.

She shoved them away.

“I just said, I don’t want anything from you!”

“Perhaps you’ll make an exception,” he said calmly, “considering that your nose is running.”

She flushed, grabbed the towels, put them to her nose and gave a long, noisy blow.

“Much better.”

“Good. I wouldn’t want to offend Your Highness’s delicate sensibilities.”

Her voice was shaky but he could see her self-control returning. He had the feeling she was going to need it.

“I know you’re being sarcastic, cara, but—”

“Such perception!”

“—but, sarcasm aside, it’s inappropriate to address me by my title.”

Aimee burst out laughing. “Now you’re going to give me lessons in court etiquette? God almighty, what a horrible human being you—”

“I do not believe in such formality,” he said, cursing himself for a fool because he knew damned well a man couldn’t sound more formal than he did right now. He paused, took a breath and got on with it. “Particularly from the woman who is about to become my wife.”

Chapter Eight

MARRY HIM?

Marry Nicolo Barbieri.

The man who had seduced her. And he had, no matter what he claimed. He’d started it all. Followed her into that bathroom. Locked the door. Lifted her onto the marble vanity. Torn aside her panties.

Thrust deep into her…and even now, despite everything, just thinking of what it had been like made her body quicken.

What was the matter with her, that she should still feel desire for him? She couldn’t blame him for making her pregnant—she hadn’t been thinking any more clearly than he that night—but there was no escaping that he’d made love to her…

And then called her a slut because he believed she’d been part of some ugly scheme of her grandfather’s.

Why wouldn’t he think that? Nicolo was every bit as ruthless and driven as the coldhearted old man who’d raised her.

James was willing to sell her for the good of his kingdom. Nicolo was willing to buy her for the same reason. He’d probably been willing to do it from the instant her grandfather suggested it.

All that indignation this morning, the fiery show of contempt for her and her grandfather, had been a lie to placate his own ego. He’d needed to justify a devil’s bargain and she and her answering machine had handed it to him, all prettily gift-wrapped and tied with a great big bow.

She was pregnant with his baby. What better way to agree to marrying her than by making it seem a gallant gesture?

Except, she knew the truth.

The Prince of All He Surveyed was about as gallant as a fifteen-century monarch weighing the benefits of a royal marriage—except for one enormous difference.

No matter what he thought, she wasn’t governed by the rules of James Black’s kingdom. She was not a princess. She didn’t have to marry a tyrant she didn’t know, didn’t love, didn’t even like.

“Well, cara? Has my proposal swept you off your feet, or shall I take your silence as wholehearted agreement?”

Aimee looked up. Nicolo’s words were sarcastic but his eyes were cool and watchful. He had to know she wasn’t going to agree—or maybe he didn’t. He was just arrogant enough, imperious enough, to assume his proposal—and wasn’t that an amazing thing to call it—was everything a woman in her situation could want.

She almost laughed. He was in for one hell of a surprise!

Learning she was pregnant, having to make all the tough choices that came next without anyone to help her, was the most terrifying thing that had ever happened.

Only one thing could possibly be more frightening: marriage to a man like the Evil Prince.

Aimee tossed her head, as if none of this was worth discussion.

“I have lots to say,” she said evenly. “But for both our sakes, I’ll stay with thanks but no thanks and, oh, by the way, don’t let the door hit you in the butt on your way out.”

Good, she thought. Not original, but concise. She’d have liked it better if he showed some reaction but he didn’t. No look of surprise. Not even anger. All he did was smile and, God, she hated that smile, the all-knowing insolence of it.

“Perhaps ‘proposal’ is the wrong word,” he said smoothly.

“At least we can agree on that. ‘Decree’ is the word that came to my mind.” Aimee smiled, too, and lifted her chin. “There’s only one problem. You may be a prince but I’m not one of your subjects. Your ridiculous pronouncements don’t mean a thing to me.”

“So much for my attempt at being gallant.”

She’d been right. And what was that tiny twinge of regret all about? She knew she was a pawn in a game played between Nicolo and her grandfather.

Now, he knew that she knew it.

Dark Knight takes pawn. Checkmate.

“That’s unfortunate, Aimee.” Another of those quick, infuriating smiles lifted one corner of his mouth. “The easiest path to a goal is generally the preferable one.”

“And the easiest path to the door is right behind you. Goodbye, Nicolo. I hope I never have the misfortune of seeing you again.”

Still no reaction. Damn it, she wanted one! Didn’t the man know when he was being insulted?

Apparently not.

Instead of heading for the door, he picked up the things he’d dropped and took a little black notebook from his pocket, flipped it open, found the page he wanted and frowned.

“Wednesday,” he said briskly. His frown deepened. “No. On second thought…” Another glance, a nod, and then he scrawled something with the pen. “I must be in Rome by Wednesday but I am free tomorrow.” The pen and notebook went back into his pocket; he folded his arms and looked at her, his expression unreadable. “Will ten in the morning be suitable?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“For our marriage, cara. What else have we been discussing?”

Aimee laughed. That, finally, got a reaction. Oh, if looks could kill…

“You find this amusing?”

“Actually I find it incredible. I’m sure people trip over their feet in an effort to please you but here’s a news flash, Prince.” Her laughter faded; her face became as stony as his. “I am not marrying you.”

“You are pregnant.”

“I am pregnant. I am pregnant,” she repeated, pounding her fist between her breasts for emphasis. “And I am perfectly capable of handling the situation myself.”

“What happened is my responsibility.”

“A little while ago you were busy saying it was mine.”

“I was wrong.” He drew himself up. “I am the man and such things are a man’s duty.”

Another time, the ridiculous speech might have made her roll her eyes. Not now. He meant it. Or wanted to think he meant it. Or wanted her to think he meant it.

Anything, to get his hands on her grandfather’s bank and extend the scope and power of the Barbieri empire.

“How nice,” she said softly. “And how amazing, that you should turn into this—this ethical creature instead of the son of a bitch we both know you—”

A cry broke from her throat as he clasped her shoulders.

“Call me whatever you like. Hate me as much as pleases you. It changes nothing. I live by a set of rules that necessitate I accept responsibility for my actions.” His grasp on her eased. “Perhaps it took me a while to accept that but what I learned just now took me by surprise.”

“Have you ever counted how many times you use the words ‘I’ and ‘me’ and ‘my’? Try it sometime. You might be surprised. Oh, and here’s another thing that might surprise you.” She pulled free of his hands. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice that marrying me will drop Stafford-Coleridge-Black right into your hands?”

“An undeniable fact, I agree.”

“Then, let me be more direct.” Aimee’s eyes were hot with warning. “I will not marry you under any—”

Nicolo cursed, grabbed her, hauled her into his arms and captured her mouth with his. It was sudden; she had no time to think, no time to do anything except let it happen…

No time to keep her lips from parting hungrily under the pressure of his.

When he drew back, she stood motionless, heart racing, body tingling, while he watched her through narrowed eyes.

“There is an American expression,” he said softly. “Win-win. Do you know it, cara? It is the perfect way to describe what I have in mind.”

“I know what you have in mind. And I don’t want any part of it.”

“Your grandfather wants an heir. I want SCB.”

“And you’d marry me to get it.”

“James says you are an intelligent woman. Can’t you see beyond your pride?”

Did he think that was why she wouldn’t agree? Because of her pride? Did he think that if he’d wanted her—her, not an expansion of his empire—she’d have agreed to this outrageous marriage?

“You’re right,” she said, her voice shaking, “I do have too much pride to marry someone like you.”

His eyes went cold. “This discussion is over.”

“You said that before. And I agree. It’s over. So are your pathetic attempts to convince me to marry you.”

“I was going to tell you that I would be willing to let you try your hand at helping me run SCB, once it is mine.” His mouth thinned. “Now, I would not even allow you to play at being in charge of the mail room.”

“What a coldhearted bastard you are.”

“No,” he said calmly, “not at all. For all intents and purposes, I had no father. I would wish better for my child.”

“Such a noble sentiment! Too bad I know that this is all about SCB. Well, I don’t give a damn for SCB! And nothing you say or do can make me change my mind.”

Nicolo smiled thinly. “I wonder if you’ll feel that way when I tell your grandfather that you carry my child, that I have offered to marry you and that you have refused.”

“Do it,” she said recklessly. “I hate you. I hate him—”

“You may hate me, cara, but you don’t hate that old man. If you did, you wouldn’t have been so hurt by the things he said this morning.” His gaze hardened. “Your grandfather hasn’t much longer to live,” he said bluntly. “Would you have him die knowing you denied him the things only you can give him?”

Aimee knotted her hands. “Is there anything you won’t do to get your own way?”

“Win-win, cara,” he said softly. “A peaceful close to your grandfather’s long life. Legitimacy for our child.” He drew her against him, his arousal swift and obvious against the V of her thighs. “And a bonus,” he said, his voice low and rough. “Or must I remind you what it was like when we made love?”

“It was sex, not love. And if you really think I’d ever let you touch me again—”

Nicolo laughed, gathered her against him and kissed her.

She struggled. Fought. But his kiss was deep and all-consuming and in a heartbeat, she was kissing him back.

It was the same as the night they’d met.

The fire. The hunger. The heavy race of her heart. The only way she could keep from falling was to clutch his jacket, rise on her toes, cling to him and cling to him until he let go of her.

It took a moment to catch her breath. By then, he had strolled to the door.

“Ten o’clock,” he said over his shoulder. “And be prompt. I don’t have time to waste.”

“You—you—”

Blindly she snatched a glass from the counter and flung it. It shattered against the wall an inch from his head but he didn’t turn around. If he had—if he had, he thought grimly as he yanked the door open and went into the hall, God only knew what he’d have done.

There was a limit to how much of a woman’s anger a man had to take.

Halfway down the stairs, he took out his cell phone and called his attorney.

“This is Nicolo Barbieri. I wish to be married tomorrow,” he said brusquely, aware and not giving a damn that this was exactly the kind of arrogance Aimee had accused him of. “The woman’s name is Aimee Stafford Coleridge Black.” He listened for a moment, then made an impatient sound. “Rules and regulations are your concern, signore, not mine. Find a way around them, make the necessary arrangements and send a report, the paperwork, whatever is necessary, to me at my hotel. No, not as soon as you can. Tonight.”

Nicolo snapped his phone shut and stepped into the street. It was raining again. Dio, what was with this combination? Rain, and Aimee Black. It was as if the skies were trying to tell him something. He had no coat, no umbrella and from what he could see, there wasn’t a subway station in the vicinity. No bus stops, either, and as always when it rained in Manhattan, the taxis seemed to have vanished.

He was at least forty blocks from his hotel.

He began walking. The exercise would do him good. Maybe he could work off some of his anger.

Aimee wasn’t the only one who was furious.

He was, too.

At her. At himself. At how easily she could make him lose his grip on logic and self-control, the very qualities that had helped him build what she so disparagingly referred to as his kingdom.

He knew men who lived on the largesse of those impressed by a useless title.

Not Nicolo.

He had worked hard for all he had, though Aimee made it clear she didn’t think so. She didn’t like him. Didn’t respect him.

Why in hell was he going to marry her?

To gain Stafford-Coleridge-Black? Ridiculous. He wanted it, yes, but not enough to tie himself to a woman he didn’t love.

To give her unborn child a name? He wasn’t even sure the child was his. How had he forgotten that?

And even if it was, he didn’t need to marry Aimee to accept the responsibilities of paternity. He could even make it a point to be part of the child’s life.

Well, as much as he could.

If he’d been calmer, he’d have seen all this right away. But Aimee had forced a confrontation. Her anger had fueled his and he’d let her wrest control of the situation from him.

She was good at that.

The only time he’d been in command was the night he’d made love to her. She had been his. Moaning at his touch. Sighing at his kisses. Trembling under his caresses.

Nicolo cursed.

It had been nothing more than sex, as she’d so coldly pointed out. It was just that the passage of time had made it seem more exciting than it had actually been.

And even if it had been extraordinary, why would he want to tie himself to her? To any woman, but especially to this one, who had the disposition of a tigress?

That was fine in bed but out of it a man wanted a sweet-tempered, obedient woman. He knew dozens like that, every one beautiful and sexy and a thousand times easier to handle.

Which brought him back to reality and the knowledge that he couldn’t come up with a single, rational reason to go through with this wedding, and what a hell of a relief that was.

Nicolo slowed his steps. The rain had stopped. The sun was out. Taxis prowled the streets again. He hailed one, got inside and told the driver the name of his hotel.

He would go to Aimee’s apartment at ten tomorrow morning because he had said that was what he would do, but when he arrived, he’d tell her he’d changed his mind, that he didn’t want to marry her.

He’d tell her the rest, too, that he would support the child—and her, of course—and, in general, do the right thing.

Problem solved.

Nicolo folded his arms, sat back and smiled. He was soaked to the skin but he was happy.

Hours later, the bellman delivered a thin manila envelope from Nicolo’s attorney.

A note inside assured him that all he had to do in the morning was take the attached documents and his prospective bride to a building in lower Manhattan, ask for a particular judge and he and the lady in question would be married within the hour.

That there was no longer a prospective bride was beside the point. The papers were simply a reminder of how foolish he’d almost been, and he shoved them aside.

He went to bed at eleven. At midnight, he got up and paced the confines of the suite. When he lay down again more than an hour later, he fell into troubled sleep. His dreams were murky and unpleasant, involving a small boy wandering the somber halls of Stafford-Coleridge-Black in search of something nameless and elusive. Each time the child was on the verge of finding it, Nicolo woke up.

At dawn, he gave up, phoned down for coffee, rye toast and the Times and the Wall Street Journal. Showered, shaved and dressed in chinos and a navy shirt with the sleeves rolled up, he sat by the sitting room window to have his breakfast and read the papers.

The coffee was fine. The toast was dry. So was the writing in both the Times and the Journal. Why else would he be unable to focus on any of the articles?

Nicolo tossed them aside and checked his watch for what had to be the tenth time since he’d awakened. Seven-thirty. Too early to show up at Aimee’s door and tell her she could forget about marrying him.

He could imagine how happy that would make her. She might even smile, something he hadn’t seen her do since the night he’d taken her to bed.

He was happy, too. If he was feeling grim, it was only because he wanted to get the damned thing over with.

Seven forty-five.

Seven fifty.

Seven fifty-seven.

“Merda,” Nicolo snarled, and shot from his chair.

He could arrive at Aimee’s any time he wanted. There was no right time to deliver good news. Besides, she didn’t have to be ready. She wasn’t going anywhere.

Traffic was heavy and it was almost eight-thirty when he climbed the steps to Aimee’s building. Yesterday’s rain hadn’t done much to clean the grungy stoop.

The first thing he’d do would be to buy her a condo in a decent neighborhood.

This was not a fit place to raise her child.

He paused outside her apartment, then rang the bell. He rang it again. She might be in the shower, getting ready for his arrival. Or, knowing Aimee, not getting ready.

It almost made him smile.

Whatever else she was, she was brave. He’d never known a woman to stand up to him before. He knew damned well yesterday’s argument wasn’t over. The second she opened the door and saw him, she’d lift her chin in that way she had and tell him what he could do with his marriage proposal.

He’d let her rant for a few seconds and then he’d say, There is no proposal, cara. I have decided I would sooner live with a scorpion than with you.

The door opened.

Everything he’d anticipated was wrong.

Aimee didn’t lift her chin. She didn’t rant. And, even though he’d shown up more than an hour early, he could see that she had been waiting for him.

She wore a simple yellow sundress and white sandals with little heels. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail, her face was bare of makeup and her eyes were suspiciously bright as if she’d been crying.

She looked painfully young, heartbreakingly vulnerable—and incredibly beautiful.

For one wild moment, Nicolo imagined taking her in his arms, telling her she had nothing to be afraid of. That he would be good to her, that he would take care of her…

He frowned, then cleared his throat.

“Aimee. I have come to tell you—”

“What? More threats?” Her chin rose now, just as he’d expected. “Let me save you the trouble.” She took a shaky breath. “I thought it through.” She gave an unsteady laugh. “Actually, it’s all I thought about since you left yesterday. And—and you’re right, Nicolo. I have no choice but to marry you.”

He stared at her in disbelief. Say something, he told himself, tell her you’ve changed your mind!

“You were right. About my grandfather. I want to hate him but I can’t. He raised me. He gave me all the things he believed I needed and if I needed more, his love, his respect…”

Aimee stopped the rush of words. Why bare her soul? She was going to marry Nicolo Barbieri. That was enough.

“He’s old,” she continued, her voice low. “And growing frail. I don’t want to look back after he’s gone and know I denied him the only things he ever asked of me, the bank in your hands, and—” color rose in her cheeks “—and your child.”

Nicolo said nothing. After a few seconds, Aimee cleared her throat. “So, I’ll marry you.”

“But?” His smile was thin. “Don’t look so surprised, cara. One would have to be deaf not to have heard that unspoken word.”

“This marriage—it will be in name only. A legal convenience that will end on my grandfather’s death.”

Aimee waited, trying to read Nicolo’s expression, but it told her nothing.

“No sex,” he finally said, his voice silken.

She nodded. “None.”

“And tell me, cara. What am I to do when I want sex?”

The seemingly subservient woman of the last few moments disappeared. Aimee’s eyes flashed with her old defiance.

“You’ll do whatever you must but you’ll be discreet about it.”

Nicolo burst out laughing. She felt her hands ball. How she wanted to slap that laugh from his face!

“Let me be sure I understand this. I marry you. I give you my name. My title. And at some point in the future, we divorce and I end up with alimony payments and child support. In return for all this, you will not complain when I keep a mistress. Is that right?”

He didn’t wait for an answer. Instead he swept her into his arms and drew her against him.

“Here is how it will be,” he growled. “You will be my wife. You will be available to me whenever I wish. Night. Day. Anywhere, anytime. If I also want a mistress, I will have one.”

“I won’t marry you under those conditions!”

“Si. You will. And if there is a divorce, it will be because I have wearied of you.” She tried to wrench free; his hold on her tightened. “And before you say, ‘no, Nicolo, I won’t marry you under those conditions,’ consider this.” He leaned toward her, eyes glittering. “I can take this child from you the day it’s born. Do not shake your head! I am Prince Nicolo Antonius Barbieri. No court would deny me the right to my own flesh and blood. Is that clear?”

“You no good, evil, vicious bastard,” she hissed, “you son of a—”

Nicolo captured her mouth with his, kissed her again and again until she trembled in his arms.

Then he picked up the small suitcase near her feet and jerked his head toward the door.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.