Ultimate Heroes Collection

by Various Authors

  And his rejection would be the ultimate humiliation.

  ‘Go and brush your hair,’ her father ordered, his black eyes filled with contempt. ‘He’ll be here in the next five minutes and he wants to meet you.’

  Chessie stared at her father in horror. Brush her hair? Rocco Castellani was a man who dated models and actresses. What difference was it going to make whether she brushed her hair? What she really needed was to lose six inches in height and two stone in weight in the space of the next five minutes.

  With an anguished glance at her mother, who was silent as usual, Chessie slid out of the room and returned to her bedroom. She splashed her face in the bathroom, and was just reaching for a comb when she heard the throaty growl of a powerful car approaching the house.

  Sneaking to the window, she watched with a mixture of resignation and fascination as a sleek black sports car came to a halt outside the house and Castellani stepped out of the driver’s seat.

  Il lupo, she thought weakly as the comb slipped through her fingers and fell to the floor. The wolf. Wasn’t that what the business pages called him? He attacked failing companies and either broke them up or turned them, depending on which was likely to make him the most profit. He was a risk-taker: bold, ruthless and fearless.

  And he was the most amazing-looking man she’d ever seen.

  His hair was glossy black, and gleamed under the powerful Sicilian sun. A pair of dark glasses covered his eyes, but she knew that they’d be dark, too. He was over six foot in height and powerfully built, with a lithe, athletic body that was designed to meet the most extreme physical challenge, and he wore his masculinity as easily as he wore his clothes. No woman could look at him and not want.

  And then there was her …

  Turning to look at herself in the mirror, Chessie suppressed a groan. How was he going to react when he saw her? He was probably going to pass out with shock and laughter that anyone would even suggest that he should marry her.

  Suddenly she wished her wardrobe were full of sexy clothes, like the ones she knew other girls wore when they went out, but everything she owned was shapeless and dark. Her father didn’t allow her to wear anything that might attract attention to her full figure. There was only one word to describe her, and that was ‘frump’.

  Wondering whether she had time to start digging an escape tunnel, she went downstairs with a feeling of dread, preparing herself for humiliation.

  Rocco Castellani was talking to her father in Italian, and they broke off when she entered the room.

  Her father introduced her, and Chessie stood in anguished silence, not knowing what on earth she could possibly say to redeem the situation. If Rocco Castellani had any sense, he’d run while he still could.

  But he didn’t run.

  He stood there, legs planted firmly apart in a stance as confident as it was aggressively masculine. Finally he broke the silence. ‘Your gardens are beautiful,’ he observed, in a velvety tone that heated her insides to melting point. ‘Perhaps Francesca could show me around?’

  Her father frowned his disapproval of that suggestion. ‘I’ll arrange for someone to accompany you.’

  ‘That won’t be necessary.’ Rocco looked up and there was steel under his smile. ‘Your daughter will be safe with me.’

  Safe. Safe? Chessie clamped her lips together to stop herself from screaming with frustration. She didn’t want to be safe. She wanted to escape from the repressive confines of her narrow, small little world. She wanted to live. She wanted to discover the true meaning of the word passion. If Rocco Castellani felt even remotely tempted to make a serious pass at her then that was fine with her.

  All the other girls she knew had started experimenting with boys and sex while still at school, and here was she at the ripe age of twenty-one, not even allowed to go for a walk with a man unless someone was watching! Rocco was going to think she was a schoolgirl, and what man in his right mind wanted to marry an awkward adolescent?

  Perhaps her father had realised that, because he finally agreed and they walked together in the garden. Rocco totally relaxed and at ease; herself dying in a thousand agonies of shyness and embarrassment. But, instead of appearing bored, Rocco went out of his way to show her kindness. He gently probed and questioned until finally she was forced to abandon her tortured silence and answer him.

  And he made her laugh. Twice. Which felt amazing, because she couldn’t remember the last time she’d actually found anything in her life worth laughing at.

  It was the first of several meetings, and each time Rocco insisted that they spend time alone, and each time he made her smile. By their fourth meeting she’d decided that he was the nicest person she’d ever met, and by their fifth meeting she was in love with him.

  All the same, on the day that he asked her to marry him she stared at the ground, painfully self-conscious, unable to believe she’d actually heard him correctly.

  ‘You’re asking me because it’s what my father wants.’

  ‘If you think that then you don’t know me at all,’ he said, in that slow, lazy drawl that always made her nerve-endings tingle. ‘I’ve never in my life done anything to please anyone but myself. I’m congenitally selfish.’ He slipped a hand under her chin and lifted her face so that she was forced to look at him.

  Chessie felt her insides tumble. He was asking her to marry him because it was what he wanted? ‘I’m not the right sort of woman to be your wife.’

  ‘You’re exactly the right sort of woman to be my wife. If you weren’t then we wouldn’t be having this conversation now.’

  She looked at him with disbelief. Rocco Castellani seriously wanted to marry her? ‘Why?’

  The look on his face indicated that he wasn’t accustomed to explaining himself. ‘Because we can have a good marriage,’ he said, with arrogant self-assurance. ‘We make each other laugh, and you are everything I want in a wife.’

  She wanted to pinch herself and beat herself with sticks, just to see whether she’d wake up from the dream. She was the girl everyone at the convent had laughed at. She was frumpy and awkward. And yet this god among men had chosen her. Rocco Castellani. Suddenly she wanted to drag him into the middle of the village, just so that she could tell everyone and show him off.

  ‘Francesca?’ There was amusement in his tone. ‘I’m waiting for an answer. Is it yes?’

  An answer? He wanted her answer? Since when had a man ever cared about her opinion on anything? ‘Yes,’ she replied in a shaky voice. ‘Yes, of course.’ How could she contemplate a different answer? Suddenly the world seemed accessible. With him she could lead the sort of life that had only ever been in her dreams.

  And they’d be happy.

  No more agonising loneliness.

  No more isolation.

  She was finally going to live.

  Chessie brought herself back to the present and realised that Rocco was still watching her. She gave up on the plate of food in front of her. Somehow just being with him had wiped out her appetite.

  Her stomach churned and flipped in a way that she didn’t recognise.

  ‘Eat something.’ He leaned forward and topped up her glass. ‘Starving yourself isn’t going to solve any of your problems.’

  Neither was putting on any more weight. Painfully conscious that she was already several stone heavier than the woman he’d danced with at their wedding, she once again wished she were flat-chested. She wore baggy tops in dark colours, but still it wasn’t possible to entirely conceal her shape.

  ‘I’m really not hungry” She cast a sideways glance towards the villa, but there was no sign of the staff. ‘I need to know where my mother is. Will you find her for me?’

  ‘What makes you think I would I be able to do that?’

  ‘You’re Sicilian. You have influence, I know you do. You could find her if you wanted to.’

  He helped himself to more wine. ‘She should have stayed in the family home, mourning your father.’

  ‘Don’t ever judge
my mother.’ Forgetting her churning stomach, Chessie rose to her feet, her legs shaking. ‘If you knew what she had put up with for all those years, you’d recommend her for a sainthood.’

  Rocco’s eyes lingered thoughtfully on her face. ‘I’m starting to gain the impression that your father wasn’t the easiest man to live with. Sit down, Francesca. Tension at the meal table gives me indigestion.’

  She remained standing, her fingers gripping the table, her cheeks pink from the wine. ‘You can’t just—’

  ‘Chessie.’ His voice was level. ‘Sit down.’

  She sat, her heart thumping at his more informal use of her name. It was the first time he’d called her anything other than Francesca, and on his lips the shortened version of her name sounded—intimate?

  ‘Do you get a thrill out of ordering me around?’ There was a long silence and his eyes held hers. A powerful bolt of electricity stabbed through her body.

  ‘I fully intend to show you what gives me a thrill as soon as I’ve finished my dinner,’ he informed her in a silky tone, and she sank further into her seat.

  ‘If you’re talking about sex again then you ought to know that I have absolutely no desire to go to bed with you.’

  He smiled. ‘Of course you do. You’re desperate to go to bed with me, but you’re still sulking about Lorna. You can relax. I’m not with her any more. That relationship is over.’

  Chessie gasped at his monumental lack of tact. ‘And that’s supposed to make me feel better?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t it? My relationship with Lorna was purely physical, and it’s finished. Before our wedding.’ Clearly believing that those facts made everything all right, he gave a careless shrug. ‘So you really have no need to be jealous.’

  ‘I keep telling you that I’m not jealous. I just don’t like you!’ She shook her head in disbelief. ‘You say that your relationship was purely physical, but is it ever more than that for you? Do you ever actually like the women that you have affairs with?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Have you ever been in love?’

  Rocco muttered something in Italian that she didn’t catch. Then he leaned forward, a slightly mocking gleam in his eyes. ‘Grow up,’ he advised, in a silky tone. ‘You’re in the real world now. Relationships between adults are complex and are carried out on many levels.’

  ‘From what I can see, yours are carried out on only the one level,’ Chessie muttered. ‘And that’s horizontal.’

  Rocco lifted a hand in a dismissive gesture. ‘And what’s wrong with that? We both know you’ve done exactly the same thing, so stop acting like an outraged virgin. From this point onwards the past is forgotten.’

  Suddenly she wished she hadn’t told that lie about Carlo, but at the time she’d seriously believed that he’d reject her if he thought she’d been with another man. ‘I don’t find you attractive and I have no desire to go to bed with you.’

  He reached for his glass, his expression amused. ‘Fifteen seconds,’ he said softly, raising the glass in a silent salute. ‘That’s all I need to make you change your mind. Possibly less.’ His gaze dropped to her mouth and she felt a burning heat rush into her pelvis.

  ‘Maybe I’m going to be the first woman to reject you. Did that thought ever occur to you?’

  ‘No.’

  She wished he’d stop looking at her mouth. Nervous and unsettled, she reached for her wine glass. Didn’t people drink when they needed courage? Well, she needed a mountain of the stuff. She sipped cautiously, and then sipped again, pleasantly surprised by the flavour and the scent. Several mouth-fuls later, her head started to swim. ‘This tastes really good.’

  ‘You’re not supposed to drink the entire glass in one mouthful.’

  ‘I’m thirsty.’ She drained the glass. ‘Is there any more?’

  ‘Not until you’ve eaten some food.’ Rocco slid the bottle out of her reach and she frowned at him, wondering why everything suddenly seemed fuzzy.

  ‘Stop bossing me around.’

  ‘Then stop acting like a child,’ he advised, and she looked away, unable to stand his scrutiny any longer.

  ‘Stop studying me. You’d drink too if you were in my position.’

  ‘And what position is that?’

  Should she confess that the thought of taking her clothes off in front of him made her want to die of embarrassment? No. Wasn’t a lack of confidence supposed to be unattractive? Well, she was unattractive enough already, without adding to her problems. ‘This isn’t exactly a relaxed situation, is it?’ she mumbled, letting her hand fall from the glass. Suddenly she felt exhausted. The stress of the flight, being met by Rocco, the discovery that her mother had left Sicily. It was all too much. ‘I’m really tired. Am I allowed to go to bed?’

  There was a brief silence while he studied her. ‘This is your home,’ he said evenly. ‘You do as you please.’

  Did he really expect her to believe that? She looked at him suspiciously, feeling suddenly dizzy. ‘You mean, as long as it’s something you approve of?’

  ‘Of course.’ He gave a faint smile and rose to his feet. ‘Fortunately, going to bed is something that meets with my approval. I’ll show you the bedroom.’

  ‘I know where the bedroom is.’

  ‘Today you rested in one of the guest rooms. Tonight you sleep in our bed.’

  He guided her through the palatial villa, up a wide curving staircase and into a huge, airy bedroom. White filmy curtains floated in front of glass doors that opened onto a terrace.

  ‘Oh—this is lovely.’ Her legs feeling ridiculously heavy, Chessie wandered outside and swayed suddenly. ‘My head feels sort of swimmy. It must be the wine.’

  ‘You only drank one glassful.’

  ‘Well, that’s one glassful more than I’ve drunk in the rest of my life,’ she slurred, and gave a sigh of relief as he swept her into his arms with a muttered imprecation. ‘Thank you. That’s so much better than walking.’

  Her head swam as he laid her on the bed, and she opened her eyes and stared up at his bronzed, handsome face, noticing the firm lines of disapproval around his mouth.

  ‘You’re probably worried that you’ve married an alcoholic,’ she mumbled sleepily as she rolled onto her side. ‘But don’t worry about it. Tonight is actually the first time I’ve ever touched alcohol, and the way my head is feeling now, it’s definitely going to be the last.’

  ‘The first time?’ His voice was loaded with disbelief, and she gave a soft smile and closed her eyes, the world still spinning.

  ‘Mmm. My father didn’t approve of women drinking. Actually, he didn’t approve of women at all—other than the ones he cheated on my mother with. A bit like you, really.’ The pillow was incredibly soft. ‘This is sooo comfortable. Night-night.’

  Pacing the terrace outside the bedroom, Rocco tried to contain his mounting frustration.

  She’d had one glass of wine and she was asleep on the bed.

  Just where exactly had he gone wrong?

  Francesca Mendozo should have been the perfect wife.

  When he’d first met her, she’d been discreet and painfully well mannered. She had been gentle, compliant, and she’d looked at him with a flattering degree of admiration. In fact she’d been so visibly amazed at his proposal of marriage that Rocco had been entirely sure that his choice of wife was nothing short of perfect. She was sweet, and the excitement she’d shown when he’d kissed her had been pleasantly surprising. Recalling the unexpected thud of lust that had overtaken him during that one steamy encounter in the garden, Rocco frowned. He’d always suspected that his new bride had hidden passions.

  He just hadn’t expected her to display them to another man.

  Rocco paced back across the terrace. Normally he prided himself on his level of self-restraint, but since his bride had reappeared on the scene he had fast been discovering that his threshold for explosion was lower than he’d thought.

  He was fighting a continuous battle with a vicious jealousy that
tormented his every waking moment. And he didn’t want to feel like this. He of all people should be aware of the destructive nature of that particular emotion. The fact that she was no longer a virgin was irrelevant to their future.

  He needed to put it behind him.

  The fact that she was far from being the sweet-natured, easy-going girl he’d thought he’d married, and that she was proving more of a challenge to handle than his most difficult takeover bid, shouldn’t matter.

  But, however hard he tried, he couldn’t ignore the fact that since her disappearance she appeared to be an entirely changed personality. In fact he was fast coming to the conclusion that Chessie was very possibly the most complex and contradictory woman he’d ever met.

  One moment she was yelling at him in a storming temper, displaying all the characteristic signs of female jealousy, the next she was curled up on the bed in a ball, more child than woman.

  And not once had she flirted with him or tried to please him in any way.

  Rocco let out a long breath and jabbed his fingers through his hair, wondering why women couldn’t be more straightforward.

  None of this was turning out the way he’d planned.

  When he’d made the decision that it was time to turn his attention to creating a family, he hadn’t realised how complex and time-consuming the project would be. It should have been easy. Given the number of women who had dropped him hopeful hints about being on the receiving end of a proposal of marriage, he’d had no clue that the process would be anything other than entirely simple.

  But handling Chessie was proving to be anything but simple, and he had absolutely no doubt that, given the chance, she’d be on the run again.

  It was all about ego, he reminded himself. Despite her traditional Sicilian upbringing, Chessie was clearly supersensitive about competition. Seeing Lorna at the wedding had dented her pride.

  Resigning himself to the fact that marriage was clearly nowhere near as straightforward as he’d anticipated, Rocco lined up the facts and analysed them, treating the current problem in the same way that he treated any problem. He looked for solutions.