The Italian's Bride

Eight months pregnant, and huge with it, hiding hadn’t been easy, and remaining unnoticed had become out of the question when, overcome with mixed but strong emotions, she had fainted.

She had only vague memories of being helped outside. Someone had fetched a glass of water. A female and two males, talking in rapid Italian above her spinning head, dark suspicious eyes inspecting her closely, had made her want to sink right back into oblivion. But when she’d recovered enough to reluctantly mumble her home address, when pressed, one of the men had used his mobile to summon a taxi. Into which she’d been thankfully and discreetly bundled—something rather suspect to be removed from the scene as quickly as possible.

She had thought—devoutly hoped—that that was the end of it. But plainly it hadn’t been. Unconsciously running a feather-light finger over her sleeping baby’s velvet-soft cheek, she at last found her tongue and uttered staunchly, ‘I’ve nothing to be ashamed of. Nothing!’

She’d loved Vito, admired him when he’d told her he was working hard, saving to open his own restaurant, had believed him when he’d told her he loved her, too, and that they’d marry as soon as it was financially possible.

She hadn’t known he was already married, that everything he’d said to her was untrue. He had promised marriage and happy-ever-after because he must have thought it was the only way to get her to agree to spending that weekend with him.

So what right had this hard-faced man to look at her as if she were something utterly despicable? Her voice thickening, she demanded, ‘Why are you here?’

‘Good question,’ he responded drily, noting the way she deliberately drew attention to the newest member of the Verdi family. He pushed his fists into the pockets of the exquisitely tailored mohair coat he was wearing, his impressive shoulders stiffening. ‘Not by my own wish, you understand. To set the record straight, I was dead against the family having any contact whatsoever with you.’

His mouth thinned as he explained, ‘A crumpled letter from a Portia Makepeace was found on the floor of the wreck of Vittorio’s car. It gave this address.’ His face darkened with distaste. ‘It was hysterical. I thought it had been written by a schoolgirl, not a full-grown educated woman. Then I recalled the unknown pregnant female at the funeral, the attention she’d drawn to herself, the home address she had given. After that it didn’t require the services of an Einstein to arrive at the facts. The child is my half-brother’s.’

The thought of denying it didn’t enter her head, but his disparaging words had lit a rare spark of rage in her brain.

She hadn’t been hysterical when she’d written to Vito at the classy London restaurant where he’d worked as a pastry chef—remembering his instructions never to phone him there because it would get him in deep trouble with his boss—she’d simply been worried half out of her mind.

She hadn’t heard from him for weeks, not since she’d told him the last time he’d phoned her of her pregnancy. She’d been sure something dreadful had happened to him. It had been the only thing she’d been able to think of to explain his failure to keep in touch with her.

Now she knew why he’d washed his hands of her, knew that everything he’d ever said to her had been lies, and in her own essentially practical way she was learning to accept it. But this stranger’s unforgivable scathing comment about her lack of ability when it came to the written word touched a nerve that had been raw since her early childhood.

Grey eyes glinting, she bit out sarcastically, ‘I’m sorry I’m not a reincarnation of William Shakespeare.’ She clamped her teeth together to stop them chattering. She was shaking all over. Whether from rage or the chilliness of the narrow hallway she didn’t know, but she strongly suspected the former. ‘I’d like you to leave,’ she ordered tightly.

She should have saved her breath, she thought irately. The patronising brute simply stood his ground, one ebony brow lifting derisively, a smile that held not even a flicker of warmth lifting one corner of that long, sensual mouth. ‘Pushing your luck, aren’t you? I might just take you at your word and report my mission as a failure.’ The ersatz smile disappeared at the speed of light, and his features were hard-edged as he added softly, ‘I’m quite sure that is not what you have in mind.’

He’d bet his last million lire it wasn’t! Despite the impression given by that deranged-sounding letter—bleating on about wedding plans and the baby they were expecting—this woman was no dumb klutz.

She would have continued to bombard the holding address—the astronomically expensive restaurant Vittorio had habitually frequented—with those whining, schoolgirlish letters no doubt changing in tone after the birth to demands for high levels of maintenance—or else!

But Vittorio had been tragically killed behind the wheel of one of the fast cars he’d been addicted to. So her modus operandi had changed.

Watching her intently, he expelled a sigh between his gritted teeth. He might have been inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt had she not muscled in on the private family funeral with that fainting fit which, with hindsight, he decided had to have been manufactured to make double sure of being noticed.

As if that large lumpen thing, covered in a shabby brown coat and making snuffling noises into a huge handkerchief, could have been overlooked by any one of the elegantly black-attired members of the family!

It had been the action of a woman who was out to make trouble. He sighed, not liking what he was having to do. But his father, once the contents of that letter had been made known, had been adamant.

He dragged air deep into his lungs. It stuck in his craw, but he was going to have to extend the invitation.

‘Portia—what are you doing? Who is it?’ At that moment Godfrey Makepeace emerged from the sitting room, his voice tight with the strain he’d been under since learning of his daughter’s pregnancy and the simultaneous disappearance of the man responsible—the man he’d taken an instant dislike to on the one and only occasion they’d met.

‘It’s OK, Dad.’ She turned to him, her heart contracting guiltily. He looked so careworn, with his fawn cardigan buttoned so neatly across his narrow chest, his bald head gleaming in the overhead light. Once again she’d failed him—and her mother—this time monumentally.

Portia felt really dreadful about it. They’d both impressed on her all the logical reasons why she should have had an abortion, and when logic had failed they’d resorted to pleading. But she had adamantly refused to destroy the new little life growing inside her. It wasn’t the poor mite’s fault that his father had been a lying deceiver.

‘This gentleman,’ she stressed coldly, ‘is just leaving.’

But the ‘gentleman’ had ideas of his own. Portia pulled an angry face as he stepped forward with all the spine-tingling predatory grace of a great jungle cat, his hand outstretched.

‘Mr Makepeace—Lucenzo Verdi. Vittorio was my half-brother. I apologise for intruding at this hour, but I’ve only just returned from Florence with an urgent communication from my father, Eduardo Verdi, the head of our family.’ He paused for a moment to let the information sink in and Portia could have slapped him.

Because of the press coverage following Vito’s fatal accident everyone knew of the awe-inspiring international success of the Verdi Mercantile Bank and the position Vito had held in its London headquarters. Trust this creep to rub their humble noses in his family’s power and wealth!

One of Sam’s hands escaped from the shawl and his tiny body stiffened in her loving arms. Portia barely registered her father’s guarded ‘And?’ as she gazed, entranced, at the shock of dark soft hair, the unfocused milky blue eyes that she was sure would one day turn to grey, just like her own.

Her baby was ready for his next feed and that, for the moment, was her overriding priority. Let whatsisname—Lucenzo—make his ‘communication’ and sling his hook. Her father would relay the details and she would ignore them.

And if there was a threat—implied or openly stated—that the family would fight for custody of her son, then she and Sam would simply disappear.

On that heartening but slightly scary determination she inched past the overbearing presence of the Italian, and the much smaller frame of her father, and headed for the kitchen to warm up the bottle of formula she’d stored in the fridge.

Forty-five minutes later she reluctantly laid a sleepy, contented Sam in the crib at the side of her single bed and went downstairs, her ridiculous slippers sliding on the shiny linoleum that covered the narrow treads.

The Italian would have left by now. Such humble surroundings wouldn’t be to his exalted taste. She would ask her parents what his famous communication had been about. Not that she was interested, but to ignore the Visitation from On High would rub her parents up the wrong way. And that, she admitted on a draining sigh, was something she’d been doing for most of her life.

Hooking her long, unkempt hair behind her ears, she took a deep, fortifying breath and walked into the sitting room. Her face drained of colour when she noted the impressively lean and moody frame reclining in the place of honour—her father’s armchair at the side of the electric fire—his elegantly long legs and obviously disgustingly expensive shoes stretched out on the hearthrug.

The way the arrogantly held dark head turned to her, those black eyes glittering beneath slightly lowered lids studying her as if she were a hitherto undiscovered and not very pleasant form of insect life, made her heart contract violently beneath her breastbone and then perform a series of lazy somersaults.

‘Portia—’ Her mother’s voice, far softer, lighter than usual, gave her the impetus to drag her part-fascinated, part-horrified gaze from that wickedly handsome, chillingly intimidating face. She gulped in a lungful of air and felt something prickly dance up and down her spine.

Joyce Makepeace was patting the empty space beside her on the sofa in invitation. Portia’s soft mouth fell open. Her mother’s cheeks were a becoming pink, her hazel eyes bright, her mouth smiling. The stern retired schoolmistress was actually looking fluttery!

Obeying the summons because she couldn’t think of anything else to do, Portia blundered forwards, tripping over her cumbersome slippers, feeling hot and bothered, ridiculous. She wished she’d never set eyes on the things. She was only wearing them because Betty had bought them for her. That had been really sweet of her, and her conscience would have pricked unbearably if she’d put them in the bin as her father had suggested.

Making it to the sofa without further mishap, she glanced nervously at her mother, expecting the usual frown of pained displeasure for her clumsiness. Instead she received an amazing smile, a fond pat of her hand—just as if she’d done something her parents could be proud of for once, instead of falling over her feet, making a spectacle of herself.

‘Signor Verdi—Lucenzo—’ Joyce Makepeace dimpled ‘—has something to say to you, Portia.’

A fleeting smile for Joyce curled his satanically beautiful mouth as he got lithely to his feet. His piercingly dark eyes fastened on Portia’s nervous face as he reached for the elegantly tailored charcoal overcoat he’d discarded and draped the soft folds over his arm.

If it weren’t for the facts he wouldn’t believe it. The charming, feckless, utterly faithless Vito had had many affairs—a gene he had inherited from the English girl his father had married five years after his first wife, Lucenzo’s mother, had died. A year later Christine had given birth to Vittorio and, her duty done, as she’d seen it, she’d embarked on a string of unsavoury affairs.

Lucenzo tightened his mouth with grim distaste. His half-brother had favoured svelte, stylish, long-legged blondes. So what had he been doing with this over-weight, clumsy creature? A blonde, admittedly, but there any point of reference ceased. Her hair was a mess and no self-respecting female would stick her feet into bright green things that looked like giant bloated frogs!

She must have caught Vittorio in an off-moment, possibly when he’d been drunk, and thrown herself at him…

‘You must excuse me. I’m already late for an appointment.’ Lucenzo made a point of glancing at the thin gold watch on his flat wrist. He’d had as much as he could take. Despite his warnings to his father, Portia Makepeace was about to receive all her avaricious, scheming little heart had dreamed of. The knowledge made him want to punch holes in the wall.

He eyed her coldly. ‘Your parents will relay my father’s wishes.’ He gave her a bleak, informal nod of the head. It was more than he’d thought he could manage. ‘I will see you in six weeks’ time. One of my secretaries will contact you regarding the exact time and date.’

‘One’ of his secretaries? How many did the man have? And just what did he mean about seeing her again in six weeks’ time? That was all Portia could think about as her father, looking really sprightly for a change, showed the Italian out.

And her mother said knowingly, ‘If you ever want to know the meaning of the word “exotic” just think about Lucenzo Verdi! And such a gentleman, too. Quite unlike that half-brother of his. I knew he was a rogue the moment I set eyes on him.’

‘You only met him once,’ Portia reminded her glumly.