the place was sold and my money was hers to do with
as she chooses. She drove my cousin to his death, and
even if I loved her rather than loathed her I could
never forgive her for that," Lorenzo told her harshly.
Jodie gave a small shiver.
"But you must have loved her once…"
"Why? Because I had sex with her?" Lorenzo shook
his head. "I was eighteen and driven by the desires of
my body, that was all." As he was being driven by
them right now, if he was honest, to take hold of Jodie
and take her back to his bed, so that he could finish
what had been started the night she had returned the
betrothal ring to him. There hadn’t been a single night
since then when he had not thought of doing so—
ached to do so. she’d got under his skin in a way that
no other woman had, mental images of her filling his
head and stealing away his thoughts whilst his body
raged and pulsed. Angrily he fought against the longing
taking hold of him.
Every bride felt nervous — it went with the territory,
Jodie assured herself as the alarmingly efficient stylist
the designer salon had insisted on sending to help her,
plus a seamstress and a dresser, bustled round her
bedroom.
Who would have thought that a small, quiet wedding
would involve so much strategic planning? A
little ruefully, Jodie suspected that it was her gown
rather than her that was the cause of the stylist"s relentless
insistence on overseeing every detail of her
wedding-day appearance — right down to the spa treatments
she had arranged for Jodie the previous day.
Now, massaged plucked, waxed and tinted to within
an inch of her life, Jodie tried to imagine how she
might be feeling if this was the real thing, a real wedding,
and she was standing here nervously being laced
into her corset in anticipation of making her vows to
a man she really loved and who really loved her.
But of course that was never going to happen.
Because she was never going to love a man, was she?
Was she? she repeated insistently, when her question
was met by a stubborn silence from the reassuring
inner voice that should have acknowledged and
agreed.
"No, you must pull it tighter," she could hear the
stylist instructing the dresser, and she winced as the
breath was squeezed out of her lungs.
Her hair had been arranged in an artless mix of
loose plaits coiled softly into an "up do" and then
threaded with invisible thread strung with diamonds
to complement the pearl and diamond embroidery on
her gown. A make-up artist had spent what felt like
hours working on her face to make it look as though
she wasn’t actually wearing any make-up at all,
merely a soft glow, although her eyelids had been
brushed with a subtle gold-green powder which made
them look enormous as well as reflecting the green
glitter of the emerald.
By the time the stylist was satisfied with the narrowness
of her waist, Jodie was afraid she might pass
out from an inability to breathe.
"Come and look," the stylist insisted, taking her to
stand in front of the full-length mirror.
The reflection gazing back at her was totally unfamiliar.
Huge gold eyes ringed with curling black
lashes looked at her, soft rose lips surely much fuller
than hers parted to show pearly white teeth. The
cream corset bodice of her gown revealed lushly
curved breasts and an impossibly narrow waist, whilst
silky fine cream hold-ups covered legs that seemed to
go on for ever, thanks to the height of the heels she
was having to wear.
"Bene," the stylist pronounced, beckoning to the
dresser. "Now for the skirt."
Heaven knew how she would have managed to
dress herself, Jodie reflected half an hour afterwards,
when both skirt and train had finally been arranged
to the stylist"s satisfaction, and the cream lace veil
and bodice had been slipped on to cover her hair and
bare skin.
There was a knock on the door, and some flurried
conversation out of Jodie’s earshot, and then the stylist
was handing her flowers and telling her urgently,
"It is time for you to leave…"
CHAPTER ELEVEN
FINALLY it was over: the church service, the walkabout
she hadn’t realised she would be expected to
make, greeting the well-wishers, the friends of
Lorenzo’s, who had included his lawyer and his
charming wife, and the impromptu wedding lunch
which Carlo had insisted on preparing for them whilst
everyone else in the restaurant joined in the celebration.
Nine hours of it in all, during which Jodie had
not dared to attempt to eat or drink, never mind sit
down.
And now they were finally alone, Assunta having
prepared and left them a cold supper before coming
to the church to see them married. Jodie was so exhausted
she could barely stand. The corset had become
a form of excruciating torture from which she
ached to be free with every muscle in her body that
hadn’t been numbed by its pressure.
In the hallway of the apartment, she headed for the
stairs, picking up her long skirts.
"You are tired?" Lorenzo guessed.
She could barely nod her head. Tired didn’t even
begin to describe her physical and emotional exhaustion.
Emotional exhaustion? Because of what, exactly?
She felt like kicking the unwanted inner voice
for probing and prodding — it, after all, knew as well
as she did exactly how she had felt standing next to
Lorenzo whilst the priest spoke the words of the marriage
ceremony. The light from the windows had illuminated
her face, but the inner light illuminating her
understanding of a truth she hadn’t wanted to recognise
had been far more powerful. She had hated the
feeling of deceit that had clung to her, the sense of
guilt and shame at the way they were using vows that
should have been sacred to suit their own purposes.
"I’ll come up with you," she heard Lorenzo saying.
How could a mere dress weigh so much? By the
time she reached the top of the stairs her heart was
pounding nauseatingly, and she was feeling oddly
light-headed.
Outside the door to her bedroom, Lorenzo touched
her lightly on the shoulder and said coolly, "If you’ve
got a minute…?"
They had only just been married, and he was asking
her if she had got a minute as though they were no
more than acquaintances. But then, wasn’t that exactly
what they were?
She could see that he was waiting for her to cross
the corridor and follow him into his room. Her leg
was aching painfully, but she refused to let it drag.
She stepped into his bedroom and stood as close to
the door as she could, refusing to look at the bed.
Lorenzo had walked over to the tallboy, where he"d
picked up something, and now he was walking back
towards her.
"Knowing how you feel about the emerald, I
thought you might prefer to wear this instead. Oh, and
you can keep it afterwards if you wish," he told her
with a dismissive shrug.
Silently Jodie took the small box from him and
opened it. Inside was a perfect pear-shaped solitaire
diamond. Mutely, she looked at it.
"I couldn’t possibly keep that. It must have been
very expensive."
Lorenzo was frowning at her as though her refusal
displeased him. "As you wish," he agreed curtly. "It
isn’t of any real consequence."
"Like our marriage," Jodie heard herself saying
shakily. "I really would have preferred not to have
had a church ceremony. It made me feel—" She broke
off and shook her head as she realised the impossibility
of making Lorenzo understand how she had felt.
The sudden action caused a wave of dizziness to
swamp her, followed by the shocked realisation that
she was about to faint. Instinctively she made grab
for the nearest solid object, which just happened to
be Lorenzo. As she swayed towards him Lorenzo
caught hold of her.
"It’s the dress," she managed to tell him. "It’s laced
so very tightly…"
The next minute he was turning her round, supporting
her with one arm whilst he inspected the fastenings
of her bodice and demanded grimly, "Why
didn’t you say something? How the hell does this
thing come off?"
"The skirt and the train have to come off first, before
I can remove the bodice," Jodie told him weakly.
"They’re just hooked onto it."
Before she could stop him he was feeling for the
tiny fastenings, unsnapping them with ruthless speed.
When they were all free the train and skirt sighed
softly to the floor, leaving Jodie standing in her silk
stockings, high heels, tiny boy-short briefs — and the
unbearably tight bodice.
"What on earth possessed you to wear something
so tight?" Lorenzo demanded.
"It wasn’t my idea. It was the stylist"s," Jodie admitted.
"She insisted on it being so tightly laced."
"How does it fasten?"
"It’s laced on the inside, and then fastened with
hooks and eyes." Just the effort of speaking was making
her feel sick from her inability to draw enough
air into her lungs.
"Don’t move," Lorenzo told her, leaving her standing
in the middle of the floor as he went over to the
tallboy and opened a drawer. When he came back he
was holding a pair of scissors.
"No, you can’t—" Jodie protested weakly, but it
was too late. He was already cutting into the fabric,
ignoring her protests.
She almost cried from the sheer bliss of simply
being able to breathe naturally as the corset fell away.
"Dio! It’s a wonder your flesh is not numbed and
dead," Lorenzo said critically as he studied the red
marks on her pale skin where the corset had cut into
her. "And why did you not say before now that your
leg is paining you?"
"Because it isn’t," Jodie fibbed.
"Yes, it is. Go and lie down on the bed. I will
massage it for you."
"there’s no need for you to do that," she protested.
"I’ll be fine now that I’m free of the corset." She
folded her arms over her breasts, suddenly, now that
she didn’t have to worry about taking her next breath,
acutely conscious her state of undress, but as she
shifted her weight from one foot to the other a sharp
pain shot up her injured leg, causing her to smother
a gasp of pain.
Lorenzo muttered something she couldn’t translate
and then picked her up, ignoring her tired protest as
he carried her over to the bed.
"You are the most stubborn woman I have ever
met," he told her grimly as he put her down. "Now,
lie down and I will massage your leg for you."
She wanted to refuse — out of pride if nothing
else — but the truth was that her leg was really hurting,
and the thought of having the pain massaged away
was too tempting to refuse.
Silently she lay down on her front and closed her
eyes. She had forgotten about the stockings she was
still wearing, and tensed as Lorenzo removed them—
as clinically and efficiently as though she were made
of plastic rather than female flesh and blood, she acknowledged
wryly. But her flesh knew that he was
male, and its response to the firm massaging movement
of his fingers against the aching muscles in her
thigh was most definitely not clinical.
She had originally lain on her stomach to conceal
from him both her naked breasts and her expression—
not so much out of modesty, but out of fear of what
they might reveal to him. Now, as she felt her nipples
hardening when his fingers stroked and kneaded her
aching flesh, she was very glad that she had done so.
As his fingers drew the pain out of her flesh their
touch replaced it with a very different kind of ache,
beginning deep inside her with a small fluttering pulse
that quickly grew stronger until the desire it generated
was spreading outwards into every nerve-ending.
Uncomfortably she pulled away, and moved to sit up,
fearing that somehow Lorenzo might guess what she
was experiencing.
"what’s the matter?" he demanded. "Are you worried
that I might try to seduce you?"
He was mocking her, she knew that. "No, of course
not. Why would I think that? After all, I already know
that you Don’t desire me."
She had rolled over now, and was sitting up. But
she couldn’t get off the bed because Lorenzo was
standing immediately in front of her.
"And you want me to desire you?"
"No!" she said fiercely.
"You’re lying." Lorenzo accused her, shocking her
as he suddenly drew her up to stand virtually body-
to-body with him. "But then, lying is second nature
to your sex, isn’t it?"
Yes, she was lying, Jodie admitted. Because she
had no other alternative, no other way to protect herself.
Why was he behaving like this towards her?
she’d realised from what Caterina had told her that
his childhood experiences with his mother and her
unfaithfulness to his father had given him a low opinion
of her sex, and a need to protect himself from
emotional pain, but that was no reason for him to
punish her. Just as she had no real reason to brand all
men as faithless, shallow cheats because of the way
John had behaved towards her? She swallowed uncomfortably,
unable to ignore her own inner critical
voice.
"You’re lying," Lorenzo repeated. "Admit it."
"Admit what?" Jodie challenged him recklessly.
"That I
want you? Why? What purpose or benefit is
there in my doing that? You Don’t want me. All you
want is for me to give you an excuse to go on telling
yourself that all women are like your mother and
Caterina. Well, we aren’t. You want me to lie to you
because that way you can keep on telling yourself that
all women are the same. Because You’re afraid of
wanting—"
"Enough!"
Jodie tried to protest, but it was too late. His mouth
was already covering hers, his hands almost bruising
the tender flesh of her upper arms as he held her to
him so hard that she could feel the buttons on his
shirt pressing into her skin.
"I am afraid of nothing," Lorenzo whispered
fiercely against her mouth. "Least of all of wanting
you. And to prove it…"
Before she could evade him he was kissing her,
deeply and intimately, whilst his hands stroked over
her body to cup her breasts.
She should stop him. She knew that. But her own
desire was stronger than her will-power. The anger
that had flared up between them had unleashed a passion
in Lorenzo that ignited her own and overwhelmed
her careful restraint. He lifted one hand to
her head, sliding his fingers into her hair and exposing
the slender vulnerability of her neck to the sensual
assault of his lips.
Shudders of hot, illicit pleasure that began where
his mouth caressed her skin and ended deep inside
the female heart of hers seized her, took her to a place
where reality didn’t exist and all that mattered was
following the lure of the primitive surge of her own
desire for him.
He had captured her nipple between the long lean
finger and thumb of his free hand and was playing
softly with it, then less softly when both it and its
partner stiffened with excitement. The erotic sensation
of him tugging sensually on it was relayed to her
through what felt like a million tiny nerve-endings,
magnifying the pleasure so much that she was racked
helplessly by its domination as it took her and filled
her, weakening her will-power along with her bones,
and focusing all of her straining concentration not on
the urgent warnings of her defences, but instead on
the wet heat between her legs, and the desire-swollen
flesh she ached for Lorenzo to touch.
Had she actually verbally said what she wanted?
She had communicated it to him somehow, Jodie realised
THE ITALIAN DUKE’S WIFE Page 14