A Bride Worth Millions

If she had betrayed Charlie she would have had to admit to her parents the humiliating fact that her ex-fiancé preferred his best man to her. Was she really so unattractive that no man would want her, as Charlie had said? He had accused her of having a hang-up about sex, and the truth was that he was right, Athena acknowledged, swallowing a sob and gulping down the rest of her cocktail.

The waiter must have noticed her empty glass, because he arrived at her table with another drink. She had lost track of how many cocktails she’d had—and actually she didn’t care.

Through the door of the bar she could see Luca De Rossi in the lobby, talking into his phone. He was drop-dead gorgeous, and she noticed every woman who walked past him paused to give him a lingering look. He seemed unaware that he was the centre of attention, but it was more likely that he was used to women staring at him, Athena thought ruefully. A man like Luca would not have to try very hard. One smile from his sensual mouth and most women would melt—like she had in Zenhab.

A memory slipped into her mind of him kissing her when they had been in the palace gardens. She had been watching the water droplets from the fountain sparkle like diamonds in the moonlight, but at the same time had been intensely aware of Luca standing beside her. When he had bent his head and brushed his lips over hers she had responded unthinkingly, beguiled by his simmering sensuality.

Why had he kissed her?

She watched him walk into the bar and stride over to where she was sitting. His charcoal-grey suit was expertly cut to show off his superb physique and his silky black hair was just a fraction too long, curling over his collar. He was dark, devastating, and undoubtedly dangerous—and it suddenly seemed imperative to Athena to find out the reason he had kissed her at her sister’s wedding.

The room spun when she stood up, and the floor seemed strangely lopsided as she walked towards him. She felt oddly brimming with self-assurance—as if all her inhibitions had disappeared. Even Charlie’s cruel taunt that no man would want a twenty-five-year-old virgin no longer hurt. Luca De Rossi, sex god and notorious womaniser, had kissed her once before, and it was possible—likely, even, she decided with a whoosh of confidence—that he wanted to kiss her again.

Perhaps inevitably, she tripped on the hem of her wedding dress, but Luca caught her in his strong arms as she had known he would. He was her hero and her handsome knight, she thought, giving him a beaming smile.

‘I think I might be a bit tipsy,’ she announced, trying to focus on him. ‘Although I don’t know why. All I’ve had to drink are a few lovely cocktails called Apple Bosoms.’ She giggled. ‘Oops, I didn’t mean to say bosom.’

The word had come into her mind because while she had been admiring Luca she’d felt a tingling sensation in her breasts and her nipples had felt hot and hard beneath the stiff bodice of her wedding dress. ‘I meant Apple Blossoms,’ she said carefully, wondering why her tongue felt too big for her mouth. ‘Anyway, the cocktails are made with apple juice.’

‘And calvados and vodka,’ Luca murmured as he attempted to unwind Athena’s arms from around his neck.

At least she had stopped crying, but she had clearly had too much to drink, and her wedding dress was still attracting attention from the hotel guests who had come into the bar.

‘I think I had better take you up to my room and order you some strong coffee,’ he told her, keeping his tone light and hoping he could whisk her out of the bar without her causing a scene.

She swayed, and would have fallen if he had not caught her. ‘Santa Madonna!’ he growled beneath his breath, his patience ebbing away fast. It was obvious that she could not walk, so he did the only thing he could and swept her up into his arms.

‘I think that’s a very good idea,’ Athena said over loudly. ‘Take me upstairs, Luca, and kiss me like you did in Zenhab.’

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_39b52e3b-10f1-51b9-9cfa-37e0077b9d34)

IT FELT AS though someone was using a pneumatic drill to bore into her skull. Wincing with pain, Athena forced her eyes open. Without her glasses her vision was blurred, but she was certain she did not recognise the elegant decor of eau-de-Nil walls and dusky blue furnishings.

Her mouth was parched. She carefully turned her head and made out a glass of water on the bedside table.

So she was in a bed. But whose bed?

Random memories came into her mind. Charlie and his best man Dominic in bed together... Her crazy idea to climb out of the window at Woodley Lodge and her terror when the ivy had given away and she had fallen...

Her brother-in-law Kadir’s friend Luca De Rossi had caught her before she’d hit the ground. And Luca had helped her to run away from her wedding—at least he had driven her away in his sports car and brought her to his hotel. She had a vague recollection of being in a hotel bar and Luca saying that he would take her up to his suite and make her coffee.

Which meant that this must be Luca’s room—and she must be...in Luca’s bed!

Another piece of the jigsaw slotted into place. She remembered that Luca had undone the lacing at the back of her dress before lifting the wedding gown over her head. Oh, God! Her face burned as she recalled with excruciating clarity how she had stood in front of him in her underwear and said, ‘Take me, Luca, I’m all yours.’

She thought he’d murmured, ‘Lucky me,’ in a dry tone. But she couldn’t be sure, and after that her memory was blank.

Carefully she turned her head the other way on the pillow and was relieved to find that she was alone in the bed. But the tangled silk sheets seemed to suggest that a lot of activity had taken place between them.

Athena’s heart juddered to a standstill.

Had she? Could she have had sex with Luca and not remember anything about it? He was a notorious womaniser, and she had literally thrown herself at him. Perhaps he had accepted her offer.

In a strange way it would be a relief if she’d lost her virginity without being aware of it, she thought, nibbling her lower lip with her teeth. She had allowed the incident that had happened years ago, with a university professor friend of her parents who had been giving her extra Latin tuition, to affect her for far too long. If she had had sex with Luca it couldn’t have been too traumatic if she had no recollection of it.

She sat up and instantly felt very sick. The sheet slipped down and she saw she was wearing the white push-up bra that was part of the pretty bridal underwear set she had hoped would excite Charlie on their wedding night. Grimacing, she peeped beneath the sheet and discovered that the matching lacy thong was still in place, which suggested that her virginity was also intact.

‘Good morning,’ a gravelly voice said, followed curtly by, ‘Although it beats me if there is anything good about it.’

Athena whipped her head round and instantly regretted moving so quickly as the room and her stomach lurched in unison. Luca was sitting in an armchair close to the bed. He was dressed entirely in black, and his tight-fitting sweater moulded his torso so that she could see the delineation of his powerful abdominal muscles beneath the fine wool.

Lifting her gaze higher, she noted that the night’s growth of dark stubble on his jaw accentuated his raw sexual magnetism. His mouth was curled in an even more cynical expression than usual, and she felt unnerved by the assessing expression in his amber eyes. The fact that he was dressed seemed to indicate that he had not accepted her drunken invitation the previous night, but Athena was desperate for confirmation.

‘If I spent last night in your bed, where did you sleep?’

His black brows snapped together, but his voice was deceptively soft as he drawled, ‘Where do you think I might have spent the night?’

Her jerky glance at the rumpled sheets betrayed her. Luca’s eyes narrowed and he swore. ‘Are you suggesting that I took advantage of you while you were paralytic? Could you be any more insulting?’

She swallowed and rested her aching head against the pillows. ‘I’m sorry...but I don’t remember anything that happened after you brought me to your suite last night...and I need to know if you...if we...’

He moved with the speed of an attacking cobra as he sprang up from the chair and leaned over the bed, placing his hands on either side of her head.

‘You are not in my bed. This hotel suite has two bedrooms. Let’s get a few facts straight,’ he said grimly. ‘Number one—if we’d had sex I guarantee you would remember. Number two—I only make love to women who are conscious and capable of participating. Number three...’ Luca’s wolf’s eyes gleamed with a hard brilliance ‘...I dislike being manipulated, Miss Howard.’

‘What do you mean?’ she asked shakily.

His face was so close to hers that even without her glasses she could almost count his thick black eyelashes. The rigid line of his jaw warned her that his hold on his temper was tenuous. But despite his anger Athena did not feel the wariness that she usually felt with men. Far from it. She hardly dared to breathe as her senses reacted to the warmth emanating from Luca’s body and the intangible scent of his maleness.

Molten heat washed over her entire body and pooled between her thighs. She was painfully aware of the ache in her breasts and her pebble-hard nipples chafing against her lacy bra cups. The intensity of her desire shocked her, yet deep down she felt relieved at this proof that she had normal sexual needs just like any other woman, and that the assault when she was a teenager had not destroyed her sensuality.

She pictured Luca lowering his body onto hers and pinning her to the mattress with his hard thighs. She imagined how it would feel to have her breasts crushed against his chest and her lips crushed beneath his mouth as he kissed her with fierce passion.

The urge to moisten her dry lips with the tip of her tongue was overwhelming. She saw his eyes narrow as he watched the betraying gesture, and she sensed from his sudden stillness that he knew she wanted him to kiss her.

He jerked upright, leaving her confused by her reaction to him and pink cheeked with embarrassment.

‘This is what I mean,’ he said harshly, dropping a pile of newspapers onto the bed.

Athena tried to ignore her pounding headache as she sat upright and peered at the headline on one of the papers. ‘What does it say? I can’t read it without my glasses. Thank you...’ she murmured when Luca shoved her spectacles into her hand.

She put them on and drew a sharp breath as she saw clearly the newspaper headline and the photograph below it of Luca holding her in his arms in the hotel bar. She had her arms wrapped tightly around his neck and a silly grin on her face that in the cold light of day made her want to die of mortification.

‘Bride Jilts Toff for Italian Playboy!’ screamed the headline, followed by a paragraph explaining how The Honourable Charles Fairfax had been left heartbroken after his fiancée Athena Howard had run off with his old school friend from Eton College, famous fashion designer Luca De Rossi, an hour before their lavish wedding was due to take place.

‘Oh, my God,’ Athena said faintly. There were a hundred questions in her mind and she voiced the top one. ‘How did the journalists know you had brought me to your hotel?’

‘Drop the innocent act,’ Luca growled. ‘Obviously you tipped off the press about our location and told them this lie about us having an affair.’