And then some.
The words sat between them and a frisson of tension ran down her spine because there was a threat in that word, surely. A threat and a promise.
‘What does that mean?’
He seemed to be waging a war within himself, as though there was a part of him that wanted to spit the salient facts at her feet and a part of him that wanted to protect what they’d just shared. The former won, apparently.
‘I have invested wisely these last few years, steadily amassing shares in diSalvo business interests so that I now find I own more than half of your brother’s various companies.’
She sucked in a breath. Surely it was a lie, an exaggeration?
‘I don’t believe you,’ she said after a beat had passed, her mind working fast to keep up. ‘Carlo would never have allowed that to happen.’
‘It is easy to acquire anything if you are prepared to bide your time.’
Her stomach twisted into dozens of knots. ‘To what end, though?’ The depth of his hatred made no sense to Amelia. ‘Surely you don’t want diSalvo investments?’
‘Want them? No.’ He lowered his voice. ‘I want to destroy them. I want to take your brother’s legacy and crush it into the ground, as he did my father’s. Only I will destroy him beyond any hope of redemption. I will only rest when he is destitute and starving, so that the memory of having a wallet full of money is all he has to warm him in his old age.’
She stared at this passionate man who had only a short time earlier taught her body what it was capable of feeling, the pleasures he’d lavished her with! And now she saw the beast of hatred that moved within him and shivered, for there was such coldness there, such determination, that she didn’t doubt him capable of carrying out what he’d threatened.
‘You honestly think that’s going to fix what happened to your father?’
He stayed quiet for a moment and then shrugged his broad, powerful shoulders. Her traitorous body gave a little jerk of awareness and she wanted to slap herself for feeling anything for this man except disgust. ‘Carlo played with fire. I am simply making him feel the heat of those flames.’
She gaped. ‘That’s preposterous!’
But he was, apparently, beyond arguing. He spoke with a calm insistence. ‘There are two options here, querida. Sell me your shares in Prim’Aqua and it is over. Done. I will release the grip I have on his empire and he will be safe. Or, if you keep your shares and deny me ownership of a company that is rightfully mine, I will destroy the rest of your family’s businesses. I have the power to tank them, and I will do it. And, what’s more, I will damned well enjoy it.’
Her heart was thumping. ‘You’ll destroy a huge proportion of your wealth if you do that.’
‘I have more than enough money,’ he said carelessly.
‘You’re unbelievable.’
‘Believe it.’ His eyes locked onto hers and she shivered with the force of his power. ‘And make a decision.’
‘A decision? My decision is for you to get out of my house!’ She wrenched the door open. ‘Or I’ll call the police!’
He stared at her for several moments, towering over her, and his breathing matched her own, then he shook his head. ‘I do not want to fight with you.’
‘I don’t want to fight with you either,’ she said and she shoved at his chest. ‘Get out of my house! Right now!’
She didn’t think he was going to go. And she hated that there was a very small part of her that didn’t want him to go, that wanted him to stay and fight and plead with her. To apologise for what he’d done, or tried to do. To take it all back and say he didn’t hate her family, that he wasn’t actively working to bring down her brother and father’s commercial interests.
But that was a very, very small part. Most of Amelia diSalvo hated Antonio Ferrara with every single bone in her body in that moment and couldn’t wait to see the back of him.
‘This isn’t over,’ he said, but it was soft, almost apologetic, and then he stalked out of the door and, she hoped, out of her life.
* * *
Antonio wasn’t surprised to receive a call from Carlo diSalvo the next day, but he was surprised at the effect the call had on him.
He could not speak to Carlo without thinking of Amelia, and the way her body had responded to his. He couldn’t close his eyes without seeing her tiny cottage and the fairy lights she’d decorated almost every surface with—and there was something so her about that design choice.
‘You’re a bastard,’ Carlo snapped down the phone line. ‘Did you really think I wouldn’t find out?’
Antonio stared at the view of London he had from his penthouse, Mayfair sprawling with all its Georgian beauty before him, opening up to a verdant Hyde Park. ‘I didn’t much care,’ Antonio said, not completely honest. Because he did care about something.
Amelia.
It was ridiculous, but he hadn’t been able to get her out of his head since leaving Bumblebee Cottage the night before. Nor could he shake the feeling that, for the first time in his life, he might not have handled things in the best possible way. He hadn’t achieved his aim, and he’d made things monumentally more difficult by sleeping with the enemy.
‘So what’s your plan?’ Carlo demanded, switching to his native Italian.
Antonio followed him effortlessly. ‘To destroy you. No, to do more than destroy you. I will eviscerate you. I will take everything you care about and destroy it, just for the satisfaction of seeing you suffer. My life has become a testament to your ruination.’
Carlo cursed down the phone line. ‘You actually think you’ll be able to succeed in that?’
‘It is already done,’ Antonio said, a wolfish smile spreading across his features. He disconnected the call and pushed all thoughts of Amelia from his mind. Sleeping with her hadn’t been part of the plan, but that didn’t matter. It was beside the point, just like he’d said to her. Sex had nothing to do with business, and this business was something he’d spent long years planning for.
He scrolled to his personal lawyer’s number and held the phone to his ear.
‘Herrera,’ he spoke without preamble when the call connected. ‘I need to see you. It’s about the diSalvo situation.’ He reclined in his chair, staring straight ahead and seeing only the gleam of success. The satisfaction of long-awaited revenge.
And the pair of big blue eyes that haunted him as he told his lawyer to begin tanking diSalvo interests?
They were just eyes—he would forget them soon enough. He would forget her too. Because nothing mattered more than righting the wrongs of the past. Nothing, and no one. For his father, he would succeed.
CHAPTER FIVE
AMELIA STARED AT the name across the foyer, emblazoned in solid gold letters: Herrera Inc. Her tummy was in knots as she waited in the echoing silence.
Not knots of anxiety, she hastened to remind herself. Knots of anger. Fury. Panic. Disbelief that six weeks after spending the night with a wolf in sheep’s clothing—or no clothing, as the case had been—it had been necessary to fly to Spain and wait in his office on a day that was hot and sticky, when she would have far preferred to be home in her lovely little cottage with only her books and an enormous pot of tea for company.
She’d thought about calling him and breaking the news to him over the phone. It would have been satisfying to have the power to deliver the life-changing words and then disconnect the call, letting him stew on the discovery as she had been for almost a week. But this wasn’t news one delivered over the phone, and she’d accepted that, even when it meant she would need to see Antonio once more.
Her face was pale and, though she didn’t realise it, the immaculate secretary of Antonio Herrera was watching her from beneath hooded eyes.
‘He won’t be much longer, madam,’ the woman assured her.
Did she really look that bad?
She’d mostly escaped the dreaded morning sickness, but of course it had reared its head that morning and she’d been feeling queasy all day.
She’d be better once this part was over. She had a plan, and it was simple.
Antonio, I’m pregnant, but I’m sure you won’t want any part of the pregnancy or the baby’s life, given that it’s the devil’s spawn.
Or, Antonio, I’m pregnant, and you can’t offer any amount of money that will induce me to sell this baby to you. Not everything is for sale.
Then there was the option where she just blurted names at him, every single one she could think of, obscenities and curses, in all the languages she knew.
She ground her teeth together, her hand curled around the strap of her bag, her mouth dry. She thought about getting another cup of water from the dispenser, but she must have already drunk a litre since arriving in his office almost an hour earlier.
If he’d known she was coming, she would have blamed him for keeping her waiting. But she’d intentionally used a fake name to see him, pretending to be a journalist writing an opinion piece for a broadsheet newspaper. Eventually the assistant had cracked, offering a fifteen-minute slot. But apparently Antonio viewed journalists with disdain, if his inability to stick to the schedule was anything to go by.
Another fifteen minutes later and the door cracked open. A man emerged first—not Antonio. Blond, with green eyes and tanned skin, wearing a suit but looking like he’d much prefer to be in board shorts and riding a wave. When he spoke, it was with an American accent. ‘Great to see you again, brother.’ He grinned, and he was film-star-handsome. Sigh...
Damned hormones. She stood up, knowing Antonio’s appearance was imminent and that the last thing she wanted was to be at a height disadvantage from the outset. Strength was imperative, even when it was simply a fraud.
Sure enough, a moment later he was in the doorway, only he wasn’t alone. A young boy was in his arms—only four or five, she guessed, but with the unmistakable facial features of a child born with Down’s Syndrome. And the young boy was smiling at Antonio as though he were the second coming.
‘You give your mother a high five from me, okay?’
And the little boy, on cue, lifted his hand and whacked it against Antonio’s. ‘Again!’
Antonio laughed, his eyes crinkling in the corners, and obliged, and Amelia had to dig her fingernails into her palms to stop from reacting.
Hormones! Tears were stinging her eyes suddenly at the sight of this man she hated, who happened to be the father of her baby, looking so perfectly at home with children. She blinked the tears away, assuming a look of passive impatience that was at odds with the lurching in her gut. And she felt it, the moment his eyes began to move to hers.
She glared at him, her expression icy.
‘Amelia?’ He looked genuinely surprised, and she was glad.
His friend followed Antonio’s gaze and then reached for the little boy.
‘We’ll get out of your hair, man. Just don’t leave it long before you get out to Venice Beach, yeah?’
Antonio didn’t respond. He was staring at Amelia, not speaking, simply looking. Did he think he could intimidate her? That he could make her feel anything at all any more?
She squared her shoulders and straightened her spine, staring at him with all the disdain she felt.
He’d used her.
He’d come to her house and charmed her into bed and she’d fallen in with his plans like the naïve, innocent fool she was, and hadn’t she learned her lesson? The reason she’d kept men like this at bay her whole life had unravelled before her.
The blond man and child left, the latter waving enthusiastically at Antonio as he went. But Antonio didn’t notice. His gaze was fixed squarely on Amelia.
After several moments, he crossed the foyer, his stride long, and in that time he pulled himself together.
‘I didn’t realise you were in Madrid,’ he said conversationally, as though they communicated regularly and she had simply omitted to mention the detail.
‘I came to see you,’ she said, glad when he didn’t hold a hand out to shake hers, nor attempt to kiss her cheek. There was ice between them now.
‘Really?’ He arched a brow and she wanted to slap him then, and his smug assumption that she’d come for personal reasons. For sexual reasons.
Her glare, she hoped, would put paid to any such ideas.
‘I presume you have an office in which we might speak privately?’
‘Of course,’ he murmured throatily, putting a hand in the small of her back.
And trumpets flared in her mind, bleating ‘hallelujah’ at the simple touch and she ground her teeth together in utter rejection of that. ‘I’m quite capable of walking, thank you very much,’ she said flatly and stepped to the side, away from him.
She only just caught the look of bemusement on his secretary’s face before she spun on her heel and stalked towards his office.
* * *
So she was still furious with him, obviously. But she was here, in his office, and he had to think it had something to do with Prim’Aqua. No doubt the moves he was making against Carlo were starting to worry her family—and so they should. So had she chosen to come to him, like a lion to the slaughter? To beg him to back off?
It was pretty obvious she hadn’t turned up in Madrid looking for round two of their off-the-charts sexual chemistry. His body jerked with disappointment because, no matter what he told himself about that night, there was a reason it had been tormenting his dreams.
Physically, they made some strange kind of sense.
Their bodies had moved as though they’d been designed for one another, but that meant nothing. Sex was sex. He walked a pace behind her, hating that he was staring at her as though she was a dessert on a buffet, knowing he could hardly stop himself.
Instead of the jeans and casual shirt she’d been wearing that night at Bumblebee Cottage, she’d chosen a pair of sleek black pants and a silk blouse that was a dangerous reminder of the robe she’d pulled on after her bath. She wore heels too, thin and spindly, giving her an extra few inches of height.
She’d dressed up.
For him?
At the door to his office she stepped aside, waiting. He pushed the door open then held it for her, noting with what he wished was amusement that she gave him as wide a berth as the doorway allowed.
* * *
His office was everything she’d expected. Just like her father’s. And her brother’s. And no doubt all the other dictatorial, selfish corporate tycoons who ruled the finance world. Enormous, with huge windows that framed a stunning view, impressive oak desk, state-of-the-art computer screens, a wall-mounted smart TV for conferences, a boardroom table of shiny timber surrounded by leather chairs, and white leather sofas. Different materials perhaps, but the same essence as the offices she’d been in before.
There were some indications of his personal taste. A black and white photograph of the Millau Viaduct, a small pottery toro on his desk, a stunning modern sculpture that was gunmetal grey and silver, and utterly striking.
She ignored these details though, and all the ostentatious signs of wealth, placing her handbag on a chair and turning to face him.
And she felt as if she’d been kicked in the gut.
God, he was handsome.
So handsome, with eyes that were laced with enquiry and hair that she ached to run her fingers through.
Stupid, stupid traitorous body.
Pushing any such thoughts from her mind, she tried to summon the words she’d prepared.
‘Would you like a drink?’
Her stomach heaved at the very suggestion. ‘No.’ The word was abrupt, and she winced. ‘No, thank you,’ she corrected softly.
She paced to the window overlooking Madrid and stared out at the ancient city. In the distance,
she could see a slice of Gaudí poking impishly from behind a far more sensible high rise, and she was reminded of a child hiding around the corner, awaiting a scolding. Gaudí’s irreverence was one of her favourite things about Spain.
‘Well,’ he said quietly, and the word ran down her spine like warm honey. ‘What can I do for you, Amelia?’
Her name on his lips tripped her heart up a thousand gears and she took a steadying breath, reminding herself that she was in control of her body, not the other way around.
When she hadn’t spoken, after a moment, he said, ‘I have an appointment any minute.’
‘No, you don’t.’ She swallowed. ‘I’m your appointment.’
When she turned to face him, she could see he was analysing this, examining her statement for meaning. ‘You pretended to be a journalist, simply to see me again?’
She nodded crisply.
‘Why not just give my assistant your name?’
‘Because I took a perverse pleasure in surprising you,’ she said honestly, and was rewarded with the hint of a smile at the corners of his lips.
It was too familiar—too familiar for what they were to one another, and what they’d shared. Theirs had been no love story; it had been two strangers in a thunderstorm. She’d been caught up in the romance—the storm had raged and he’d arrived, offering refuge from a clawing sense of isolation. She’d been a means to an end for him, her virginity unimportant collateral in his quest to draw her under his spell.
‘You have surprised me,’ he agreed.
You haven’t seen anything yet, she thought to herself with a wry shake of her head.
Spaniard's Baby of Revenge Page 5