Married For Revenge: Roccanti's Marriage Revenge / A Deal at the Altar / A Vow of Obligation

‘Planned?’ In a sensual daze, Zara blinked and reached for one of the towels on the rail. ‘How … planned?’

‘I forgot to use a condom. Do you take contraceptive pills?’

Zara froze and looked up at him. His devastatingly handsome face was suddenly very serious. ‘No,’ she said, the size of the risk they’d just taken slowly dawning on her. ‘And I’m about halfway through my cycle.’

‘I’ll be more careful from now on … I promise,’ Vitale asserted, running a fingertip caressingly below her sultry lower lip, swollen from his kisses. ‘But I do find you incredibly tempting. You make me dangerously impulsive.’

Meeting the urgent appeal in those stunning golden eyes, Zara could barely put one foot in front of another, never mind think logical thoughts. ‘I’m sure I’ll be fine,’ she muttered, suppressing her concern that she might fall pregnant and thinking that if she took after her mother, who, in spite of her longing for more children, had only ever conceived once in her entire life, she probably had nothing to worry about.

As he turned away to reach for a towel she saw his back and her shocked breath caught in her throat. Line after line of raised scars like welts criss-crossed his long, muscular back and there were little round darker marks as well across his shoulders and spine. ‘What on earth happened to your back?’ she asked abruptly.

Momentarily, Vitale froze in the act of towelling himself dry and shot her a glance over one broad shoulder. ‘Ancient history,’ he said dismissively.

And he did not offer to share it.

He pulled on boxers and a shirt to go downstairs with her to raid the fridge. It was Giuseppina’s day off but she had left the cabinet packed with goodies. They were both very hungry. He lit a candle on the terrace and they sat eating cold spicy chicken and salad washed down with wine and lively conversation. She wanted to ask him about his back again but was reluctant to snoop. Somehow he manoeuvred her back onto his lap and his hands travelled below her tee to cup her breasts. She stretched back against him, helpless in the grip of her instantaneous hunger and they went back to bed where he made love to her twice more. Afterwards, she lay spent on the bed watching Vitale sleep and feeling ridiculously happy.

Even in the moonlight he had the most amazing bone structure, from his high cheekbones to classic nose and his hard, angular jaw line. She wanted to touch him, trace the winged ebony brows, the sensual firmness of his mouth, but she curled her hands into fists of restraint instead. She was thinking and acting like a teenager, a lovesick teenager, she scolded herself impatiently, deliberately turning away from him and lying back again. Somehow she had never got to play it cool with Vitale the way she usually did with men and that made her feel very insecure. They had bypassed the calm getting-to-know-you phase and plunged straight into meaningful looks and passion. He was as attracted to her as she was to him, she reflected wryly, so at least the spell she was under was a mutual one …

Vitale couldn’t sleep. When he woke it was still dark and he reckoned that it was the awareness that he had company that had made him feel uneasy. After all, he always slept alone. He never stayed the night with anyone. He didn’t like that kind of closeness. By nature he was a loner and after the childhood he had endured he thought it was hardly surprising that he should be uncomfortable with any form of physical intimacy that went beyond sex. But she was very affectionate, hugging and kissing and snuggling into his lean hard frame. His eyes bleak, he eased away from her, resisting that togetherness. It would soon be over. He couldn’t work out why he didn’t feel happier about that. But then he had never been given to introspection.

‘You should have woken me up sooner!’ Zara complained several hours later as she struggled to close the zip on her case.

While Vitale had risen early, he had let her sleep in and it had been a rush to get dressed and packed ready for the time he had said they had to leave. At first it had pleased her that he was making the effort to personally drive her to the airport, but even the most insensitive woman could not have missed out on noticing how polite and almost distant Vitale seemed to be acting all of a sudden. Zara had never had a one-night stand but it struck her that her vision of how a morning after such a night would feel best described Vitale’s behaviour. The awkwardness in the atmosphere was not solely her fault. And maybe she had just enjoyed a one night stand, she reasoned painfully, maybe this was it for her and Vitale Roccanti.

What were the chances of him trying to conduct a long-distance relationship with her? Did he even visit London in the course of his work? For the very first time she acknowledged that the odds were that she might never see Vitale again.

Her potential client had become a lover and that could well have destroyed any chance of him seriously considering her for the job.

‘Do you still want to see a set of plans for the villa?’ she enquired stiffly.

‘Sì, of course,’ Vitale confirmed, shooting her a muted glance, his tension palpable as he swept up her case in a strong hand and carried it downstairs for her.

All Zara’s suspicious antennae were on alert. Had Vitale already toyed with the idea of telling her not to bother with the plans? Wouldn’t that provide a neat end to a potentially embarrassing situation? I’m never going to see him again. I’m never ever going to see himagain. The conviction cast a pall over Zara’s spirits. She told herself she didn’t care, that it didn’t matter to her, that a few days ago she had never even heard his name before. And while those thoughts whirled round and round in her mind, pride forced her head higher. With brittle efficiency she discussed arrangements for submitting plans for his inspection while ascertaining the exact level of detail he required. As he seemed to have little to say on that score she was convinced that he would reject the plan, but as Blooming Perfect always charged for putting in a basic design her time would not have been entirely wasted.

His lean, strong face set in forbidding lines, Vitale opened the front door and took her small case out to his car. Standing in the porch, she donned her jacket, her delicate features blank as she fought for composure and blamed herself bitterly for having abandoned her professionalism in the first place. This sense of discomfiture, this sharp sense of loss were the payback for her reckless behaviour.

‘Zara …’ And as she looked up she was taken aback when Vitale closed his arms round her and bent his head to kiss her, because the way he had been behaving actual physical contact had to have been about the last thing she expected from him.

But in the emotional mood Zara was in, his carnal mouth had only to touch hers for her hands to delve possessively back into his black hair. In fact she held him to her for a split second before she yanked her arms away again and angled her head back, having finally recognised in some disconcertion that he had offered her more of a peck than a passionate embrace.

But even as she released him it seemed all hell broke loose. She stared in shock and flinched at the sight of two men wielding cameras only yards away from them. The men leapt up from crouching positions, clearly having taken photos of Vitale and Zara in each other’s arms, and tore off into the trees surrounding the property to speedily disappear from sight.

‘Where on earth did they come from? Who are they, for goodness’ sake?’ Zara demanded angrily. ‘Why the heck were they taking pictures of us?’

CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_efd3ff03-20be-5a96-9d11-fae6636319e5)

‘PAPARAZZI. They must’ve staked out the house to await their chance.’ It was the incredible calm with which Vitale made that explanation that first alerted Zara to the idea that something was badly wrong. He didn’t seem surprised by the invasion of their privacy or even particularly bothered by it, which shook her.

‘But what on earth for?’ Zara queried, marvelling at his seemingly laid-back attitude when everybody she knew in the public eye hated the intrusion of muckraking journalists into their private lives.

‘Obviously you know why the paps would find photographing you with another man worth their while,’ Vitale countered with a harsh edge to his dark deep drawl, his intonation cold enough to make him sound momentarily like a stranger.

Taken aback by that tone, Zara frowned up at him. ‘If they were paps, how would they know I was here with you? Another man? What are you saying?’

Vitale quirked a derisive brow, stunning eyes dark as pitch and harder than she had ever seen them. ‘Have you forgotten your Greek fiancé? The fact that you’re marrying Sergios Demonides this summer? In the light of that, proof of your obvious intimacy with me is more than sufficient to sell a grubby tabloid story for a profit.’

Air rasped in Zara’s throat and the muscles there tightened, making it hard for her to catch her breath. She was deeply shaken by the level of his information. ‘You know about Sergios?’

‘Obviously,’ Vitale admitted drily.

‘We’re not engaged,’ she said limply, not really even knowing why she was troubling to make that distinction since it was painfully obvious that Vitale Roccanti had already judged her badly for her silence on the score of her marital commitment. ‘There was no ring, no engagement … it’s not like Sergios and I are in love with each other or anything like that—’

Vitale shifted a silencing hand, his lack of interest patent and like another slap in the face. ‘Whatever—’

‘No.’ Zara refused to be silenced, determined to defend her behaviour as best she could. ‘As soon as I got back to London I was planning to tell Sergios that I couldn’t go ahead and marry him. I wasn’t fooling around behind his back. I’m not like that. I had already decided that I couldn’t go ahead and marry him after meeting you—’

‘It’s immaterial to me—’

‘You knew about Sergios and yet you said nothing?’ Zara pressed, struggling to understand and not linger on that last lethal statement, for nothing positive could be gained from the words, ‘It’s immaterial to me.’ He didn’t care that she was supposedly marrying another man? Didn’t care in the slightest? That was a declaration of towering lack of interest that cut her to the quick.

‘If you’re to make your flight, we have to leave now.’ Vitale delivered the reminder without any emotion at all.

‘I’ll catch a later flight at my own expense,’ Zara fielded with a slight shake in her voice. ‘I’m more interested right now in finding out what’s going on here. I went to bed last night with one guy and this morning it’s like I’ve woken up with his nasty identical twin. If you knew about Sergios why didn’t you mention it?’

Vitale resisted a strong urge to ask her why she hadn’t mentioned it. Why should he care? She was faithless, pleasure-loving. She meant nothing to him, less than nothing. He breathed in deep and slow, suppressing any hint of an emotional reaction. He was keen to be done with the dialogue and it struck him that honesty was probably the best policy in the circumstances. It would draw an efficient line under their entanglement as nothing else could do. ‘I was willing to do whatever I could to ensure that your marriage plans fell through as I believe it will have a detrimental effect on your father’s hopes of selling the family hotel group to Demonides.’

Zara was so startled by that explanation that her legs wobbled beneath her and she sank down heavily on the low wall surrounding the shrubbery beside the porch. Her lavender eyes narrowed in bemused concentration when she stared up at him. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

‘I set you up,’ Vitale volunteered grimly, spelling out the facts without hesitation. ‘From start to finish. Contacting your design firm, bringing you out here—’

In receipt of that admission, Zara had slowly turned white as snow. ‘Sleeping with me?’ she interrupted jerkily, distaste scissoring through her like a blade. ‘Was that part of the set-up? If you wanted Sergios to dump me, ensuring embarrassing pictures of his future bride misbehaving appear in some tabloid rag would be a good start.’

‘I thought so too but, believe it or not,’ Vitale imparted grittily, ‘I had no wish to hurt you personally. Your father has always been my target—’

‘My father?’ Zara could feel her muscles stiffen in shock as she sat there, spine rigid, feet set as neatly together as a small child told to sit still at church, her hands so tightly clasped together in an effort at self-control that her fingers ached. ‘Why would my father have been your target?’

A bleak expression entered his eloquent gaze. ‘Sixteen years ago, your father took my sister, Loredana, out on a sailing weekend and when the yacht got into trouble he saved his own skin and left her to drown. She was twenty years old and pregnant with his child.’

In shock at that horrible story, Zara slowly shook her head as though to clear it. Sixteen years ago her father had been divorced from Bee’s mother but still a single man. Zara had been born quite a few years before her parents actually wed, but then a wedding ring or indeed a child had never kept the older man faithful. She did actually remember something happening, some kind of an upheaval, which had resulted in rows between her parents … What was it? What had happened? Her smooth brow furrowed. But no, her memory seemed to have packed up and gone home. Sixteen years ago, after all, Zara had only been a child of six. Yet Vitale had still targeted her for something he believed Monty Blake had done to his sister?

‘So now you know the truth.’

Her teeth set together so hard that her jaw thrummed in punishment but she did not want to break into impulsive speech. Yes, now she knew that once again a man had made a colossal fool of her. Maybe all the people, including her parents, who had called her dumb were right—she had not had the slightest suspicion of Vitale while he had been executing his charm offensive.

Not until this very morning, at the last possible moment, had she recognised his change of mood and attitude. So what did that say about her? That when it came to men she was criminally stupid and blind and ought not to be let out on her own, she thought painfully. To follow a Julian Hurst with a Vitale Roccanti suggested seriously bad judgement. Twice she had fallen headlong for the flattering approaches of men programmed to hurt and use her for their own purposes. And now she felt as if the bottom had fallen out of her world, as if she had been deserted and left utterly lost in alien territory. This guy, who had shamelessly used and abused her, was the guy she had actually believed she might be falling in love with? That was the lowest blow of all and it decimated her pride.

‘Call me a taxi to get me to the airport,’ Zara told him curtly.