‘There’s no one else here,’ she whispered as they were seated at a small table overlooking a pebbled beach. Small lanterns lit the way down to the shore and a light scent of salt was in the cool night air. ‘I understand we need to be cautious, but it’s so quiet.’
He nodded towards an area at the edge of the deck and watched as she turned and saw the duo of island musicians setting up under a string of fairy lights. Soon the sound of a steel drum and a rhythmic guitar began to flow through the air. She smiled as she closed her eyes and swayed a little.
‘You should do that more often,’ Valerio said silkily, taking a sip of his soda water and lime to distract himself from the hum of attraction that had refused to shift since she’d walked down the stairs in that flowy knee-length dress. She shifted and crossed one leg over the other, revealing a long, smooth expanse of perfectly curved skin. He cleared his throat, looking up to her face and away from those damn thighs. ‘I want you to enjoy these few days here. Take it as a chance to recharge before we have to return to reality.’
‘Or at least the new appearance of reality.’ She smiled again.
‘Exactly.’
The corners of his mouth tipped up slightly and for the first time he felt the urge to laugh. It was enough to stop him for a moment, before he caught himself. He’d had a hard time too, he reminded himself. Maybe they both deserved to feel a little freedom while they were here.
‘You’re starting to look serious again,’ she commented, one brow raised.
‘I was just thinking...maybe it’s time we called a truce. Let’s enjoy a few days off the grid, so to speak. No arguments or work. No serious talk.’
A simple handshake sealed the deal and they entered into a pleasant flow of conversation until their food arrived then drifted into companionable silence as the delicious food and great music added to their lighter mood.
Their waiter was a kind-faced older man, who saw the ring on Daniela’s finger and insisted that the band play a slow number for them to dance to.
Valerio stood, extending his hand to her and forcing a smile as she stood up and moved close. The music had a soft, seductive rhythm, and he found himself forgetting all the reasons why he shouldn’t be enjoying this, why he shouldn’t pull her close and pretend they were just another couple on an island adventure.
He breathed in the scent of her hair and heard the softest sigh escape her lips.
‘I didn’t expect you to be a good dancer.’ She spoke near his ear, her breath fanning his skin. ‘I should have known you’d be good at everything.’
‘You think I find everything easy?’ He subtly moved even closer, moving his hand on her back and leaning forward. ‘I stepped on every dance partner’s toes at events when I was a teenager. My mother made me go to dance lessons twice a week for six months. I was an embarrassment.’
She laughed deep in her throat as he dipped her into a flamenco-style twirl, tipping her back over his arm. ‘Well, you certainly overcame your awkward phase.’
Their eyes met for a long moment, their breath coming a little faster from their exertions. Valerio found himself wondering if he should suggest they kiss, to maintain the appearance of being a happily engaged couple. But really he just wanted to kiss her again. Wanted to see if it was his sex-starved brain that had elicited that first reaction from him after their first kiss or...if it was just simply her.
As he began tipping his head down towards her, a shout from behind them caught his attention.
They both turned and watched as one of the security guards ran down the beach and into the water towards a small boat. A single man was in the vessel, a black boxlike item in his hands. Valerio turned himself in front of Dani, shielding her with his body as he shouted for the other guard to follow.
After a few tense moments of shouting and confusion, it was revealed that the man was just a local fisherman who hadn’t been told of the restaurant’s private hire. The guards and Valerio quickly apologised to the man, and to the restaurant owner, who had been quite distressed by the commotion.
‘Get back to the car,’ Valerio growled, guiding her away from the dance floor by the elbow.
‘Valerio, it’s okay. It was just a mistake.’
‘This entire impulsive evening out was a mistake.’ He shook his head. ‘I can’t even keep you safe for one day. I need to get you back to the house now. Just...please don’t fight me on this.’
Dani didn’t fight him. She barely even spoke on the drive back to the villa, knowing that Valerio needed time to cool down after the adrenaline rush of the false alarm. She had been scared too, but he had moved swiftly from fear and protective mode to anger towards himself. She was beginning to see a pattern with him. Did he have a hero complex? Or was he hiding something about himself?
An email on her phone caught her attention as they entered the large open-plan living area of the villa.
‘The board have accepted my plans for Nettuno and the charities.’ She frowned. ‘But I never got the chance to send them my files before you asked me to step back.’
‘I sent them.’ He turned to her, both hands in his pockets. ‘I looked into your plans further after the meeting and I knew they were the best course of action. You’ll get full credit, and I’ll keep you in the loop on everything regarding Duarte’s projects.’
‘Valerio...that means more than you know—thank you.’
‘You don’t need to thank me. I should be thanking you for being so good at what you do. I’m being honest when I say I wouldn’t ask you to take this step back if it wasn’t important.’
She nodded once. ‘And you still won’t tell me exactly why?’
Valerio’s gaze became instantly defensive and he prepared to turn away.
‘No arguments, remember?’ she said quickly, knowing that she needed to take a different tack. This was a business deal, after all—why shouldn’t she employ one of her oldest moves? Entertain the opposition...keep them close. ‘I’m not going to launch into a fight, if that’s what you’re thinking. I want us to keep to our deal. A weekend of fun, starting now.’
She moved to one of the sideboards she’d investigated earlier, returning with a deck of cards. ‘How do you fancy your odds?’
‘Poker?’ He raised one brow, picking up the deck and shuffling the cards with seasoned practice. ‘You sure you’re up to playing me?’
‘You forget that I’ve been schmoozing your clientele in Monte Carlo these past few months. I’ve become quite a pro.’
‘We don’t have any chips.’
He shuffled the cards again, dancing them easily between his hands with the lightest touch. She watched his movements, transfixed by how effortlessly he manipulated the deck. The man was good with his hands...
Clearing her wandering thoughts, she sat up straighter. ‘I used to play without chips with Hermione back in college. We sat up all night, creating this stupid game where you get a forfeit instead of chips, while we were supposed to be studying for exams.’
‘A forfeit?’ His eyes met hers across the table. ‘Like Truth or Dare?’
‘More like Truth or Lies. You have to ask awkward questions and try to get the other person to lie or refuse to answer. But be warned: I’m pretty good at this.’
The premise of the game was simple enough: a crazy mix-up of various card games that only Hermione could have concocted. Each player had the chance to steal cards by challenging the other to answer a question or make a statement, then determining if the answer was the truth or a lie. The problem was, as the game went on for a few rounds, Dani realised that some of the questions Valerio was asking were quite inappropriate.
‘How many lovers have you had?’ he asked boldly.
Dani answered honestly, praying she didn’t blush with embarrassment as she admitted she had only ever been with Kitt. Valerio’s eyes burned into hers, widening with disbelief as he decl
ared it a lie, and she shook her head, taking her share of his cards as her forfeit.
‘How many lovers have you had?’ Dani asked when it was her turn, trying and failing to keep a straight face.
Valerio pursed his lips, counting the fingers on both hands, then reaching for a pen and jotting down some sums. ‘Let me see. Carry the two...multiply by seven... Roughly in the low hundreds.’
‘Okay, well, I’m just going to say that’s true.’ She shrugged, pretending not to care about his answer.
‘Lie.’ His eyes sparkled as he took her cards. ‘I’m actually quite discerning about who I take to bed, despite the tabloid rumours. You have a low opinion of me.’
Dani smirked. ‘Well, what is the number, then?’
‘Ah-ah, that’s not a part of the game.’
He laughed as she groaned her annoyance.
‘What’s your biggest fear?’ he asked on the next turn, his gaze strangely focused on her and a slight curve to his mouth. He was enjoying this, she thought.
‘That’s an easy one. The open sea,’ she said easily, schooling her features.
When he guessed that she was lying, she shook her head, grabbing yet more of his cards.
‘You’re serious? You work at a yacht charter company and you’re afraid of the open sea?’ He let out a bark of laughter.
‘I’m just afraid of swimming in it—not sailing. I don’t like to sail myself, but I trust the boats.’
She sat back as they played another hand, feeling his eyes on her the entire time. The next time her turn came up, she felt the effect of the wine kicking in, along with a new sense of bravado. She asked him some questions about his childhood, his decision not to join his father’s company—everything she could think of that she’d always wished to ask.
‘What’s your most shameful secret?’ he asked on his next turn, laughing when she grimaced at his question. ‘You know the rules: you have to give an answer or you forfeit.’
‘Well, unlucky for you, that’s an easy one for me.’ She met his gaze, throwing out her best poker face. ‘I have never had a proper orgasm.’
His brow furrowed, his eyes narrowing on her for one intense moment before they widened in a mixture of surprise and anger.
‘You have to say if you think it’s true or false,’ she said, but she was instantly regretting her flirty answer, wondering what on earth had possessed her. ‘Or we can just move on.’
The air was still and silent between them, except for the sound of insects chirping and waves crashing against the cliffs nearby. She pursed her lips, sitting up and flicking her hair over her shoulder.
‘Forget that one. I’ll give you the cards and let’s just move on.’
A long exhalation escaped Valerio’s lips. Dani looked up to see his hands in tight fists on his lap.
‘Madre di Dio. I knew that pompous lawyer was beyond useless. You actually believe that you are somehow defective because of that idiot?’
‘It’s not always the man’s fault, Valerio. And it’s kind of a sensitive subject,’ she said tightly. ‘Draw your next hand, please.’ She heard the ice in her voice—it was a sore subject for her. But she wasn’t about to discuss it over some stupid card game.
‘Even if it’s true—which is up for debate—you’re telling me he made you believe that it was your fault? That you can’t—?’
‘I said draw your next hand.’
The next round was more heated, with Dani using her best tricks to ensure she won. She knew she was a damn good card player, even if it was an utterly ridiculous game.
She met his eyes across the table. ‘Time for your most shameful secret, Mr Marchesi. And it had better match mine.’
Valerio sat back in his seat, still feeling the tension within him from her revelation. He wiped a hand down his face, wishing they’d never started playing this game. She was just giving him as good as she got—she had no idea how many secrets he held in. But she had asked to know before...about Rio. Maybe this was his chance to share his burden with her. He only hoped she would be able to handle it.
‘Valerio, you don’t have to answer,’ she said quickly, obviously taking in the change in him. ‘I’ll choose a different question.’
‘You answered yours,’ he said simply. ‘I have no problem continuing to play by the rules. My most shameful secret is easy. Most people believe me to be some kind of hero, but the reality is that I’m the opposite. I’m a coward. It was my fault that your brother was killed and I will never forgive myself for that.’
‘Valerio...’ she breathed.
‘No. You asked me for the truth once before, and I walked away. You deserve to know how he died.’
An unbearable pity was there in her deep brown eyes as she nodded once and gestured for him to proceed. He felt her attention on him like the warm heat of the sun, watched her delicate hands folding and unfolding in her lap as she waited. They both knew this wasn’t just a game any more.
‘I followed him to Rio when he asked me not to. We were attacked by a van full of men and taken,’ he began, hearing his own voice sounding out perfectly clear in the night air, as somewhere deep inside his chest ached. ‘I woke up in a shipping yard, surrounded by men in black hoods. They roared questions in a Portuguese dialect that I couldn’t even begin to understand. Duarte was tied up beside me for a while but then they separated us. They were far more interested in him than me.’ In his mind, he remembered the solemn look on Duarte’s face as he apologised for dragging him into such a mess... He swore he would get them both freed. That he had a plan, but he made him vow to protect Dani if anything happened to him.
But for days on end they had tortured him and Duarte in turn, in front of each other, never allowing him to speak, only Duarte, using their loyalty to one another against them.
‘Days passed... They tortured me for fun. I didn’t have anything else they needed. I had already offered them money... After they broke my knee and I could no longer fight back, they got bored. Then they mostly just left me alone in the dark.’
He heard a sob and looked up to see that Dani had covered her face with her hands, but he had to finish this while he could. He owed her this story, even if he knew it might break her to hear it. He hoped she was strong enough.
‘Eventually they lost their patience. A man brought Duarte in and held a gun to my head. Someone asked in English how much his friend’s life was worth. But one of the guards who I hadn’t seen before turned his gun on the others. He freed us both before they killed him. I had a gun in my hand but I hesitated. I had the chance to end it and I didn’t. They shot Duarte by accident. I saw the panic in their eyes once they realised. They debated shooting me too but got disturbed by someone outside and just knocked me out instead. When I woke up, Duarte’s body was gone and so were they.’
Valerio remembered staggering out of that shipping yard. He was found on the street. When the police came, they found tracks leading to the dock—evidence that a body had been dumped in the water. Washed out to sea. They’d dragged his friend’s body away, denied him a proper burial.
He shook his head as if coming out of a daze.
‘You know the rest.’
He felt a warm weight on the seat beside him and felt himself cocooned in the soft comfort of her intoxicating scent. She leaned her head against his shoulder, her sharp breaths telling him that she was crying even though she hid her face.
‘Thank you,’ she said simply, and then she allowed the silence to stretch on for a long while. She seemed to know instinctively that he couldn’t speak any more, that he needed to just...be...for a moment.
No matter how many times he allowed himself to access those memories, they always seemed to hit him with the same force. The look on Duarte’s face as he’d realised they weren’t getting out of that shipping yard alive. The look of pure hatred in the masked men’s eyes as they’d tried aga
in and again to beat him into submission.
Every single moment was like a pinprick in his skin, every vision a reminder of what he might have done differently, how he might have saved his friend’s life if he’d not hesitated that split second.
After a long time Dani sat up and turned to him, her eyes a mess of smudged make-up.
‘Lie,’ she said, an echo to their earlier game.
‘Is that your attempt at a joke?’
‘I would never joke about what you went through. You came back alive—you survived the unimaginable. But the way you tell that story... It’s as though you feel you were to blame for my brother’s death. As though you could have saved him if you’d done something different. You’re lying to yourself. Punishing yourself for surviving.’
Valerio looked away, his jaw tightening with anger. ‘You have no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘I know that you’re a good man. That you would have done what you believed was right. You were under so much pressure—’
‘Stop.’ He stood up, fury and resentment choking him, making him want to lash out. ‘You blame me for his death just as much as everyone else. Are you telling me you have never wondered how I survived when he was clearly the more experienced fighter? You think I don’t know what people say about me behind my back? You’ve had the luxury of grieving him without knowing the details, without having them permanently etched in your memory as a lifelong torture. Do you think you can just pull me out of my life, tie me to a bed and order me to get back to work...go back to living my life? Do you think I can just switch any of this off?’
He laughed, harsh and low.
‘I’m done with this game.’
Dani stood up, walking quietly to the door back into the villa. She paused, turning back for a moment to meet his eyes. When she spoke her voice was surprisingly calm and soft in the aftermath of all the venom he’d just thrown at her.
The Vows He Must Keep (Mills & Boon Modern) (The Avelar Family Scandals, Book 1) Page 10