Once a Ferrara Wife...

CHAPTER TWO

CRISTIANO downed the glass of whisky in one, trying to blunt the savage bite of his emotions as he waited on the terrace of the villa for Laurel to make an appearance.

He’d promised himself that he would be icily calm and detached. That resolution had lasted until she’d stepped off the plane. His plan to make no reference to their situation had exploded under the intense pressure of the reunion. The conflicting emotions had been like a storm inside him, made all the more fierce by her own lack of response. Laurel had turned hiding her emotions into an art form.

Wishing he had time to go for a run and burn off some of the adrenalin scalding his veins, Cristiano lifted a hand and slid a finger into the collar of his white dress shirt. Deprived of one stress reliever, he reached for another and topped up his glass with a hand that wasn’t quite steady.

She still blamed him. That much was obvious but, even now, she wouldn’t talk about it.

Immediately after the event he’d tried, but she’d appeared to be in shock, her reaction to the miscarriage far more extreme than he would have anticipated.

His own sadness at the loss of their baby had been tempered with a sense of realism. Miscarriages happened. His own mother had lost two babies. His aunt, one. It was Laurel’s first pregnancy. He’d been philosophical.

She’d been inconsolable. And stubborn.

Apart from that one message on his voicemail, the one telling him not to bother to cut short his meeting because she’d lost the baby, she’d refused to talk about what had happened.

Sweat prickled the back of his neck and he wished for the millionth time he hadn’t switched off his phone before going into that meeting.

If he’d answered the call, would they be in a different place now?

Contemplating the celebration that lay ahead made him want to empty the bottle of whisky. He was in desperate need of an anaesthetic to dull his senses and relieve the pain.

Maybe it was because his own marriage was such a total disaster that he hated weddings so much.

Part of him wished his sister had just eloped quietly, but that had never been on the cards. She was marrying a Sicilian man in true Sicilian style and he, as her older brother and the head of the family, was expected to play a major part in the celebrations. The family honour was at stake. The image of the Ferrara dynasty. He was expected to celebrate.

‘I’m ready.’ Her voice came from behind him and this time he made sure that he had himself fully under control before he turned.

Even prepared, the connection was immediate and powerful.

It was like being trapped in an electrical storm. The air around him crackled and buzzed with a tension that hadn’t been there before she’d stepped over the threshold.

Ready? He almost laughed. Neither of them would ever be ready for what they were about to face. Their estrangement had attracted almost as much attention as their wedding. There would be no cameras tonight, but that didn’t mean the guests wouldn’t be interested. With that macabre fascination that drew people to stare at the wreckage of car accidents, everyone was waiting to see how he was going to treat his scandalous estranged wife.

Looking at her, he felt the attraction punch through his gut. Her body was slim and supremely fit and wrapped in a dress of fine blue silk. On most women the dress would have been monumentally unforgiving. Laurel had nothing that needed forgiving. Her body was her brand and she dressed to showcase it and drive her business. It wouldn’t have surprised him to see her web address stamped on her hemline. Ferrara Fitness. He’d been the one who had spotted her potential and persuaded her to expand—to broaden what she offered from the personal to the corporate.

She wasn’t beautiful in a classical sense, but her guts and drive had proved a greater aphrodisiac than sleek blonde hair or a perfect D cup. Only he knew that her restrained appearance and tiger-like personality hid monumental insecurities.

From the outside no one would ever have guessed that on the inside she was such a mess, he mused, but he’d never met anyone more screwed up than Laurel. It had taken months for her to open up to him even a little and, when she had, the cold reality of her childhood had shocked him. It was a story of care homes and neglect, and just a brief glimpse into what her life had been was enough for him to begin to understand why she was so different from most of the women he met.

Had it been arrogance, he wondered, that had made him so sure that he could break down those defensive barriers? He’d demanded trust from someone who had never had reason to give it and, in the end, it had backfired badly.

Any residual guilt he might have felt about his own behaviour at that time had long been erased by his anger that she hadn’t even given him a chance to fix his mistake. She’d ended their marriage with the finality of an executioner, refusing both rational conversation and the diamonds he’d bought her by way of apology.

Dark emotions swirled inside him and he studied her face for signs that she was regretting her decision. Her features were blank, but that didn’t surprise him. She’d trained herself to reveal nothing. To rely on no one. Extracting anything from her had been a challenge.

Even now she chose to keep the conversation neutral. ‘You changed the room overlooking the garden from a gym to a cinema.’

She would have noticed, of course, because that was her job. And Laurel was one hundred per cent committed to her job. Which was why they’d wanted her involved in the business. From the moment her success with one very overweight actress had been blazoned over the press, Laurel Hampton had become the personal trainer that everyone wanted. The fact that she’d agreed to advise the hotel had been a coup for both of them. He had her name on his brand and she had his. It had been a winning combination.

Hampton had become Ferrara.

And that was when the combination had exploded.

‘I watch sport. I don’t need a gym when I’m here.’ Cristiano felt a flicker of exasperation. Their marriage was writhing in its death throes and they were discussing gym equipment?

Something glinted around her neck and he frowned at the thin gold chain. The fact that she was wearing jewellery he didn’t recognise racked his tension levels up a few more notches and drove all thoughts from his brain. He hadn’t given her the chain, so where the hell had it come from?

He pictured a pair of male hands fastening the necklace around her slender throat. Someone else touching her. Someone else persuading her to part with her secrets—

It was something that hadn’t occurred to him before now.

Only when he heard the splintering sound of glass on ceramic tiles did he realise he’d dropped the glass he was holding.

Eyeing him as she would an escaped tiger, Laurel backed away. ‘I’ll get a brush—’ ‘Leave it.’ ‘But—’

‘I said, leave it. The staff will sort it out. We need to go.

I’m the host.’

‘Everyone will be speculating.’

‘They wouldn’t dare. At least, not publicly.’

She gave a bitter laugh. ‘Sorry. I forgot you even manage to control people’s thoughts.’

Suddenly Cristiano wished he hadn’t dropped the glass. God only knew he needed something to get him through the next few hours. The gold necklace glinted in the sunshine, taunting him. Following an impulse he didn’t want to examine too closely, he grabbed her left hand and lifted it. She made a sound in her throat and tugged but he simply tightened his grip, shocked by the emotion that tore through him when he saw her bare finger.

‘Where is your wedding ring?’

‘I don’t wear it. We’re no longer married.’

‘We’re married until we’re divorced and in Sicily that takes three years—’ Teeth gritted, tone thickened, he held tightly to her hand as she twisted her fingers and tried to free herself.

‘It’s a bit late to be possessive. Marriage is about more than a ring, Cristiano, and more than a piece of paper.’

‘You are telling me what constitutes marriage? You, who treated our marriage as something disposable?’ Outrage and fury mingled in a lethal cocktail. ‘Why remove your ring? Is there someone else?’

‘This weekend isn’t about us, it’s about your sister.’

He’d wanted a denial.

He’d wanted her to laugh and say, Of course there isn’t anyone else—how could there be?

He’d wanted her to admit that what they’d shared had been rare and special. Instead she was dismissing it. She’d consigned it to the dustbin of past mistakes.

Driven by an emotion he didn’t understand, he grabbed her shoulders and yanked her against him. If he’d been more controlled he might have asked himself why he was trying to goad her, but he didn’t feel controlled. The fact that she seemed indifferent simply intensified his urge to draw a response from her.