The Wedding Charade

‘You. Will. Marry. Me. Nic Sabbatini.’ She bit out each word as if she were spitting bullets.

He curled a lip as he held the green lightning of her gaze. ‘Or else?’ he said.

Her eyes flared, the thick black heavily mascara-coated lashes almost reaching her finely arched brows. She licked her mouth, making it glisten and shimmer, the action of her tongue sending a rocket-fuelled charge of blood to his pelvis.

Nic grabbed her hand before she could move away, wrapping his fingers around her wrist until they overlapped. ‘You’re going about this all wrong, Jade,’ he said, pulling her farther in between his thighs. ‘Why not use some of that sensual charm you’re known for instead of coming at me like a cornered cat? Who knows what you might be able to talk me into doing, hmm?’

She flattened her mouth, her eyes full of disdain as they tussled with his. ‘Let go of me,’ she said through clenched teeth.

Nic elevated his eyebrow again. ‘That’s not what you were saying when you were sixteen.’

Her cheeks were like twin pools of crushed raspberries, which seemed strangely at odds with her cutting retort. ‘You missed your chance, Italian boy. Your best friend took home the prize. He wasn’t the best I’ve had but at least he was the first.’

Nic worked on controlling his breathing, dousing his blistering anger with the ice-cold water of common sense. She was deliberately goading him. It was what she did best. She had been doing it for as long as he had known her. She was a tart who used sex to get what she wanted.

He had done the honourable thing all those years ago, rejecting her advances, seeing them for what they were: a young, immature girl’s grab for attention. He had lectured her about her behaviour but she had ignored his warning, deliberately seducing one of his closest friends to drive home her petulant point. It had destroyed his friendship with his mate and it had destroyed any respect he’d had for Jade. He had been prepared to give her a chance, but it seemed she was on the same path of destruction as her socialite mother had been before her death when Jade was a young child. ‘You blame me for your father’s withdrawal of your allowance, but don’t you think it might have something to do with your recent affair with Richard McCormack?’ he asked.

She tugged her wrist out of his hold and rubbed at it pointedly. ‘That was just a stitch-up in the press,’ she said. ‘He made a move on me but I wasn’t interested.’

Nic gave a snort. ‘It seems to me you’re always interested. You’re every man’s fantasy. The wild-child party girl who will do anything to be the centre of attention.’

She gave him an arch look in return. ‘You’re a fine one calling me out for being a black kettle when your pot’s been stirred by more women than any other man I know.’

Nic smiled at her imperiously because he knew it would inflame her. ‘Yes, I know it’s hypocritical of me, but there you have it. The double standard—even in spite of enlightened times—still exists. No man wants a tart for a wife.’

She frowned at him. ‘So you’re going to turn your back on your inheritance? ‘

He gave an indifferent shrug. ‘It’s just money.’

Her eyes widened again. ‘But it’s a fortune!’

‘I’m already rich,’ he said, enjoying the play of emotions on her face she was clearly struggling to disguise. ‘I can earn double that in a couple of years if I put my mind to it.’

Her frown deepened. ‘But what about your brothers? Won’t Giorgio and Luca’s shares in the Corporation be put in jeopardy if yours are given to an unknown third party?’

Nic schooled his features into a blank mask. ‘If it happens, it happens. It’s not what I would have wished but I can’t compromise my standards to fit in with an old man’s whimsical fantasy.’

This time she didn’t bother trying to hide her outrage. ‘But this is not just about you! It’s about me as well. I need that money.’

Nic leaned back in his chair again and crossed his ankles. ‘So go out and get a job,’ he said. ‘That’s what other people who haven’t been born into money do. You might even enjoy it. It will certainly make a change from having your nails and hair done.’

Her gaze seared his. ‘I don’t want a job,’ she said. ‘I want that money because your grandfather—my godfather—gave it to me. He wanted me to have it. He told me before he died that he would always be there for me.’

‘I agree he wanted you to have the money,’ Nic said. ‘He had a rather soft spot for you. God knows why, given your track record of appalling behaviour, but he did. But he also wanted to manipulate me into doing things his way and that I will not stand for.’

She pressed her lips together as she swung away to pace the carpeted floor. Nic watched her from his chair. She was agitated and rightly so. Without her father’s generous allowance, she was penniless. He knew for a fact she had no savings to speak of. She lived on credit and expected her father to clear it month by month. She had never had a job in her life. She hadn’t even finished school. She had been expelled from three prestigious British fee-paying schools and then dropped out altogether a week after enrolment at the fourth. She was trouble with a capital T.

She turned back and came to stand in front of him again, her big green eyes taking on a soulful beseeching look. ‘Please, Nic,’ she said in a whisper-soft voice. ‘Please do this one thing for me. I beg you.’

Nic drew in a long, slightly unsteady breath. She was bewitching and dangerous in this mood. He could feel the tentacles of temptation reaching out to ensnare him. He could feel the way his resolve was melting like wax under a blast of heat.

A year of marriage.

Twelve months of living together as husband and wife in order to secure a fortune. Thank God the press so far knew nothing about the terms of the will and Nic was determined to keep it that way. That would be the ultimate in public shame if word got out that he had been led to the altar with a noose around his neck, put there by his late grandfather.

But Jade was right. It was a fortune, and while he had every confidence he could earn it in his own right, given enough time, he was deeply worried about a third party shareholder. His brothers had been good about it so far. They had not put him under any undue pressure, but Nic knew Giorgio, as the financial controller, was concerned given the ongoing economic instability across Europe.

Nic knew this was a chance to show his family and the press he was not the fool-around playboy everyone painted him as. He could make this one sacrifice to secure the Corporation’s wealth and once the year was over he could get back to doing what he did best: being free from emotional entanglements. Being free to travel the world and take risks that others couldn’t or wouldn’t take. He thrived on it—the adrenalin and the surge of euphoric energy when a multimillion dollar deal was sealed.

He would agree to fulfil the terms of his grandfather’s will but not because Jade told him to.

No one but no one told him what to do.

Nic pushed back the chair as he rose from it. ‘I will have to get back to you on this,’ he said. ‘I have to go to Venice to check out a villa that’s come on the market. I’ll be away for a couple of days. I’ll give you a call when I get back.’

She blinked up at him in bewilderment, as if he had given the opposite answer to what she had been expecting. But then her beautiful face quickly reassembled itself into an expression of indignation. ‘You’re making me wait for your answer?’ she asked.

Nic gave her a mocking smile. ‘It’s called delaying gratification, cara,’ he said. ‘Hasn’t anyone told you if you wait a long time for something, when you finally get it the pleasure is a thousandfold?’

‘I will make you pay for this, Nic Sabbatini,’ she snarled. She stalked over to where she had dropped her designer handbag earlier and, scooping it up, flung the strap over one of her slim shoulders and gave him one last gelid glare before she left. ‘You see if I don’t.’

CHAPTER TWO

JADE arrived at the hotel in Venice at five in the afternoon. A member of the paparazzi had told her Nic was staying there, right on the Grand Canal. She was quite pleased with her detective work. Her sources had told her Nic was in a meeting until eight this evening, and then he would be returning to the hotel for a massage before a late dinner; she hadn’t been able to find out if he was planning to dine alone or with one of his legion of female admirers.

Nic was the sort of man who had always had women swooning over him. She, to her eternal shame, had once been one of them. It still riled her that he had rejected her when she was sixteen and madly in love with him. Although she knew it was really her own fault for being so wilful, she couldn’t help partly blaming him for the horrid experience of her first sexual encounter, not that she had ever told anyone. Even the man who had taken her virginity had no idea of how dreadful an ordeal it had been for her. But then she was good at deception. Deception was her middle name—well, it would be if she could spell it, she thought wryly.

She smiled at the concierge at the reception desk, fluttering her lashes in the manner she had perfected over the years. ‘Scusi, signor. I am meeting my fiancé here, Signor Nicolò Sabbatini. It is to be a very big … I don’t know how to say it in Italian …a big surprise?’

The concierge smiled conspiratorially. ‘Sì, signorina, I understand—a sorpresa. But I did not know Signor Sabbatini was engaged. There has been nothing about it in the press, I am sure.’

There will be shortly, Jade thought with a mischievous private grin. ‘Sì, signor, it is all very hush-hush. You know how the Sabbatini brothers hate the intrusion of the press.’ She pulled out a photo of her and Nic that had been taken at his grandfather’s funeral. It wasn’t a particularly intimate one but it showed Nic with his head leaning towards her as he whispered something before the service. Luckily, the shot didn’t show her face for she had been scowling at him in fury at the time. Jade smiled at the concierge as she showed him the photograph. ‘As you can see, we are never left alone by the press. That is why I wanted this to be our special time together before the world gets to know. I am so appreciative of your cooperation.’

‘It is my pleasure, signorina,’ he said and, handing back the photo, passed her a regulation form to fill in. ‘If you would be so kind as to give your full name and address and country of residence for our records.’

Jade felt the familiar flutter of panic build in her chest. It was like a million micro bats’ wings flapping all at once. She took a steadying breath and summoned up another megawatt smile. ‘I am sorry, signor, but I have taken out my contact lenses for the flight,’ she said. ‘They are packed in my luggage somewhere. I am practically blind without them and I hate wearing glasses. So unfashionable, don’t you think? Would you be so kind as to just type my details straight into your computer? ‘

The concierge smiled. ‘But of course, signorina,’ he said, his fingers poised over the keys as she gave him her details.

‘You are so very kind,’ Jade said as he handed her a swipe key.

‘Signor Sabbatini is staying on the top floor in the penthouse suite. I will have your luggage taken to the room straight away.’

‘Grazie, signor. But there is one more thing,’ she said, leaning closer. ‘Would you mind contacting the masseuse who was coming at eight?’ She gave him a twinkling smile. ‘I will give my fiancé a massage instead. He will enjoy it so much more, sì?’

The concierge grinned. ‘Sì, signorina. I am sure he will.’

Jade made her way to the lift, smiling at her reflection in the brass-plated doors once they were closed. She had dressed in her best look-at-me clothes. A black and sinfully short tight-fitting dress with a daringly low neck and shoes with the sort of heels podiatrists the world over shook their heads in dismay at, and flashy jewellery that screeched inherited wealth and decadence.