Sins of the Past

‘I thought …’ She was toying agitatedly with the black and grey beaded necklace which lay just above her small breasts. What was he doing here? From what she’d read about him nowadays his UK home was a bachelor apartment in the most fashionable suburb of London. Not this quiet, countrified retreat …

‘You thought what?’ He sent a cursory glance over his shoulder, following the direction of her gaze. ‘My secretary,’ he enlightened her, answering her unspoken question. ‘She was simply handling the appointment.’

And probably a lot more than that, Riva thought waspishly, thinking of the string of stunning high-profile women she had seen his name linked with in the gossip columns over the years. She remembered one article in particular in one of the tabloids recently, featuring society queen and grocery empire heiress Magenta Boweringham, who, being the latest lover to be discarded by this dynamic Italian, had gone to great lengths to report that, however brilliant and focused he might have proved himself to be in every other aspect of his life, where her own sex were concerned, Damiano D’Amico seemed to have a very low boredom threshold.

Ignoring a resurgence of the feelings she had had after reading that article, Riva uttered, baffled, ‘Madame Duval …’ Her tousled red hair caught the morning sunlight streaming in through the long sash window as she shook her head, trying to make sense of the situation.

‘My grandmother,’ he supplied, his easy tone only emphasising her confusion. ‘Obviously you weren’t told she was away.’

‘No, I wasn’t!’ Hot colour washed over her skin and she let her hand drop quickly when his gaze fell, picking up on the agitated way she was fingering her necklace. His grandmother was French? Her head was swimming. She wasn’t sure he had ever told her that. ‘Did you know?’ she demanded. ‘Did you know it was me Redwoods were sending?’ Her name must have aroused his interest, if nothing else.

A wide shoulder merely lifted beneath the fine cloth of his jacket. ‘It does leave me wondering how a girl who was little more than a market trader a few short years ago,’ he said, not answering her, ‘managed to reach the position she’s obviously enjoying now.’

‘She worked!’ Rose colour deepened along her cheekbones, vying with the fire of her hair. ‘She worked, Damiano! Which is more than she’s going to do for you!’

Angrily she brushed past him, her suspicions and disappointment over not being engaged solely on her merits overridden only by her staggering awareness of his masculinity as her arm collided with his.

Shaking from the contact, in a voice that reflected all the tension that was gripping her, she uttered, ‘I’ll tell Ms Redwood that it’s all been a mistake. Now, if you don’t mind, I think I can manage to see myself out!’

Disillusionment contested with a host of other, more complex emotions as she made her determined bid for the stairs. Only the deep, accented voice behind her stopped her precipitate flight along the corridor.

‘I really don’t think you should do that, Riva.’ Those dangerously soft words masked a barely concealed threat.

‘Wh-what do you mean?’ She turned around to see him dominating the narrow space outside the sitting room, and for all her twenty-four years she felt as out of her depth with him as she had as a hapless nineteen-year-old, smitten by that voice, by his earth-shattering looks, his intellect, and his irresistible Continental charm.

‘You’ve been sent here for a specific purpose, and I expect you to honour that purpose. Otherwise I shall have no hesitation in telling your very hard-nosed employer that I shall be taking my business elsewhere.’

A car engine starting up in the courtyard below the window broke the small shocked silence that stretched between them.

His secretary leaving. Leaving her alone with him, Riva decided, with an inexplicable little shudder.

Her blood started pounding, a thundering drum-roll in her ears. Of course. He was more valuable to Redwoods than she was, she realised. And if she refused to work with him, and he reported her lack of co-operation, then it would be her the firm would let go for losing such a prestigious client—not the other way around.

The green eyes looking up into the dark ebony of his sparked with accusation. ‘You mean … you’d get me fired?’ Her voice was strung with anger, disbelief.

His shoulder moved again in that subtly careless gesture. ‘You’d get yourself fired, Riva. Or not. The choice is yours.’

And if she made the wrong one, refused to do exactly as he said, he would destroy her. Just as he had destroyed her dear and oh, so vulnerable mother, because without his cruel intervention Chelsea Singleman would almost surely be alive today!

‘Go back into the sitting room,’ he ordered, in no doubt of the power he wielded.

Reminding herself of how hard she’d worked for this job, and of all she had to lose if she walked away from him, Riva thrust past him again, steeling herself against the sensations that assailed her this time when he didn’t move to allow her an easy route back and once again her arm grazed the sleeve of his jacket.

‘Do that again and I’ll take it that you’re inviting more than just my custom. And we both know what happened the last time you did that, don’t we?’

He had used her, ruthlessly and cold-bloodedly, employing that lethal mix of easy charm and magnetism to snare her. She had been too na?ve and inexperienced to recognise the calculated game he was playing, only realising it afterwards with her pride and her dignity in shreds!

‘I didn’t invite your custom, Damiano. You’re forcing it on me.’

‘Like you’ve probably convinced yourself it was me forcing you … what was it? … four and a half—nearly five years ago?’

Surprisingly, the vital images his words conjured up still had the power to make her blood race, the memory of those warm, skilled hands on her body making her cheeks flame with humiliating shame.

Because she had been a willing conquest beneath those practised hands of his, mindlessly inviting their intimate caresses, mistaking tenderness for affection, his cold, calculated seduction for something much, much more.

Acridly she murmured, ‘No. That was nothing more than my own stupidity.’

That dark head tilted slightly, and a humourless smile still played around the corners of his devastating mouth.

‘You could scarcely blame me for wanting to get at the truth.’

‘The truth? Hah! You wouldn’t recognise the truth if it uprooted itself and tried to wrap itself around your throat!’

He smiled coldly at her graphic metaphor. ‘I didn’t have to. All the evidence spoke for itself.’

Because she had lied to him—and big-time!—covering up even the most personal facts about herself. But only because she had been embarrassed, so unbearably ashamed. He’d been angry with her afterwards, but more, she’d suspected, with himself. Perhaps finding out he’d used a virgin in his plan to destroy Chelsea Singleman didn’t sit too comfortably on his conscience. If he had one! Riva thought vehemently, although she doubted it.

Green eyes glittering with a host of complex emotions, she breathed accusingly, ‘You ruined my mother’s life.’

Damiano’s mouth moved grimly. ‘Because I was instrumental in preventing her from marrying my uncle? I would have been guilty of neglecting my duty if I hadn’t. Anyway, I’m sure she got over it. Women like Chelsea—and I’m afraid to say like you, cara—aren’t left grieving too long over one lost opportunity. If she hasn’t done so yet, I’m sure that before long she’ll find some other rich … what do you English call it? … sucker who will fall prey to her devious charms.’

Pain as sharp as a whiplash cut into Riva’s heart, and it took all her self-control to stop herself lunging forward and knocking the disdain right off that hard, arrogant face.

‘My mother’s dead!’

His obvious shock was a picture she would have relished if she hadn’t felt so raw inside.

The sound of a man whistling for his dog in the quiet lane beyond the courtyard filtered through the open window—the only thing intruding on the loaded silence.

‘I’m sorry.’

She’d have to admit that he looked it, if she hadn’t known him to be incapable of such selfless emotion.

‘No, you’re not.’ How could he even say that when he had contributed so directly to the woman’s inevitable slide into the despair that had finally killed her—and at such a brutally young age?

‘What happened?’

‘What do you care?’

His features hardened at her lack of response. ‘Tell me.’

She didn’t want to. It hurt too much to talk about her once effervescent young mother—who had insisted on Riva calling her Chelsea—especially in front of the one man she had hoped never to see again.

His whole demeanour, however, commanded, and reluctantly she found herself yielding to the sway of his forceful personality by saying, ‘If you must know, it was an accidental overdose of drugs she’d been taking for depression.’ She had also been drinking too, although she didn’t tell him that. The doctors had said it was a lethal mix.

‘When?’

‘Just over a year ago.’