‘I couldn’t go.’
‘I’m not laughing.’ He answered her question.
‘What I do here is important to me,’ she told him.
‘I can see that,’ he answered. ‘Why couldn’t you go?’
Her eyelashes flickered. Everything felt as if it was coming to her through a confused mist. She wet her lips with her tongue, linked her fingers together in a trembling pleat across her trembling stomach.
‘Y-you didn’t want me to,’ she murmured unsteadily. ‘Y-you trusted me to stay but I didn’t trust you to…’ The words trailed away on a wash of distraction. ‘Th-that s-sketch you’re holding isn’t a good likeness.’ Her fingers unpleated so she could point to what he was holding in his hand.
He looked down at it like someone who had no idea that he was holding anything. ‘You think I’m a shark,’ he murmured as he looked back at her.
‘Sometimes.’ She nodded.
‘Are you coming in, or are you thinking of running again?’
‘Oh.’ It was her turn to glance down as if she didn’t know where she was or what she was doing. She was still standing on the threshold, with her case sitting beside her and her bag swinging from one of her shoulders.
She went to pick up the case. The moment she moved, so did Marco. He came across the bare-board floor at the speed of lightning. The case was lifted out of her reach. Her arm was imprisoned in long fingers. Before she knew what he was about she was fully inside the room and the door was being firmly closed behind her.
That was when she saw Stefan, leaning against a wall with his arms casually folded and his expression—interested. ‘Hi,’ she murmured self-consciously.
‘Hi, yourself,’ Stefan softly replied. ‘I don’t suppose you would like to explain what’s been going on here?’ he drily requested.
‘She doesn’t need to explain anything,’ Marco put in tensely, and his hand tightened on her arm as if he expected her to break free and run, when in actual fact she was already hanging on to his shirt at his waistband and had no intention of letting go of it.
Stefan sent the dry look Marco’s way. ‘She does if you want me to get out of here,’ he replied, without bothering to hide his meaning.
Marco grimaced and remained silent, conceding Stefan’s right to demand an explanation.
Still shaking too much, and not thinking straight, it needed a few attempts at breathing properly before Antonia could find some semblance of intelligence.
‘Y-you know I paint. You taught me to do it,’ she reminded Stefan.
‘You taught yourself,’ he drily corrected. ‘By being a pain in the neck and insisting on placing your easel next to mine every time I worked so you could copy my every damn brushstroke.’
‘I learned from you then.’ She sighed at the play with semantics.
‘Not this kind of stuff,’ he said with derision. ‘This is chocolate-box art they sell on street corners.’
‘It’s art,’ Marco sliced back at him in her defence.
It was sweet of him, but Stefan was right. ‘Shops,’ she corrected. ‘I sell them to the shops on the Brera. They sell them to the tourists. It—it makes me a nice little living…’
‘So that’s why you hardly ever touched the money I gave you,’ Marco said bleakly.
‘And your serious work?’ Stefan asked, refusing to be sidetracked.
She tensed up; so did Marco. ‘What serious work?’ he demanded.
‘You saw an example of it last night,’ Stefan informed him, without taking his eyes off Antonia’s suddenly angry face.
‘Dio mio,’ Marco breathed, his eyes wide with surprise as he stared at her. ‘You mean you painted your own nude study?’
‘Sometimes I hate you,’ she hissed at Stefan.
Stefan just shrugged, moved out of his lazy stance against the wall and began walking towards them. ‘Ask her about the one she has stashed against the wall over there,’ he suggested to Marco as he passed by them. Then he paused, leaned over to kiss Antonia’s angry cheek. ‘Pack the chocolate-box stuff in before you ruin yourself with it,’ he warned seriously, then pulled open the door and left them to it.
Or left Antonia to stand there on her own while she watched Marco stride across the room to the large canvas Stefan had so kindly pointed out to him.
Her cheeks began to heat, her body to stiffen in readiness for what was to come. She tried to divert him. ‘Marco, we need to talk…’
But it was already too late. ‘Now, just look at what we have here,’ he drawled lazily. And with a deft flick of his hands he scooped the painting up and took it over to her easel.
She struggled not to gasp. Her cheeks were on fire. Standing back, he proceeded to study the nude painting of himself with the all-seeing eye of the complete connoisseur.
When he started to grin, she felt like following Stefan. But the way he reached out and touched the lean shape of a sleek male thigh was pure infuriating conceit.
‘It’s all wrong,’ she snapped. ‘The proportions are out. Your nose looks like Caesar’s and your torso is too long!’
‘I think it’s perfect.’
He would, she thought with an angry frown. ‘I hate people looking at my work until it’s finished!’
‘You mean you hate me looking at it!’ His mood changed so swiftly she wasn’t prepared for it. From lazy conceit he was suddenly pulsing with fury. ‘Why?’ he demanded, walking back to her. ‘Why couldn’t you tell me that you can paint like this? I thought I knew you! But I’ve been living with a stranger! Your mother sits on my wall but you don’t bother to tell me that! Your ex-lover has never been your ex-lover! In fact, I bet you never even had a lover before me—did you?’ She blushed and shook her head, which only infuriated him more. He continued heatedly, ‘You have a rat for a father. And you have a gift at your fingertips that I would have thought you would have been proud to let me see!’
‘You own a Rembrandt!’ she fired at him defensively.
‘I own a Kranst!’ he threw right back. ‘Many works by totally unknown artists. And the Rembrandt! Are you saying I am an art snob on top of all my other failings?’
‘Your opinion meant too much to me!’ she cried. ‘So it was safer not to seek it!’
He grabbed her and kissed her. And about time too, she thought as she fell into the kiss like a woman starved.
‘Dio mio,’ he rasped against her clinging lips. ‘Do you have any idea what it did to me to come back and find you gone today?’
‘I cried all the way to the airport,’ she confessed, as if that should make it easier for him.
It didn’t. ‘Don’t ever leave me like that again!’
‘I won’t,’ she promised.
He sunk them into another hot deep hungry kiss that didn’t last long enough before he was pulling right back. ‘No, you won’t,’ he agreed. ‘Because I am going to make sure that you don’t!’
His hand went into his pocket and came out again, holding a small black leather box.
The moment Antonia saw it she knew what it was. And on a choke of dismay, she said, ‘No,’ and snapped her hands behind her back. ‘You don’t have to do that.’
She even started backing away.
He followed. ‘Of course I do.’ He reached for her.
‘No!’ she cried, and almost bounced as her shoulders hit the wall behind her.
Marco started frowning. ‘Amore, this is what I want. It is what we both want!’
But she kept on shaking her head. ‘I came back,’ she repeated. ‘I don’t need this to keep me here! A ring will just make everything more complicated! I would rather—’
‘It’s okay,’ he said soothingly. ‘I squared it with my father. He—’
Her eyes shot to his. Her mouth trembled. ‘You told your father about me?’ She looked so horrified it hurt. ‘But you had no right to upset him with this when he’s ill!’
‘Ill,’ Marco agreed. ‘Not incompetent! And it is out of respect for his illness that I sought his approval.
But do you honestly think I am the kind of man who requires the approval of anyone?’
‘You require mine,’ she pointed out. ‘And I am not prepared to come between you and your parents. I don’t need to do that. I am perfectly happy with things as they were.’
‘Well, I’m not,’ he announced, his eyes narrowing on the sudden leap of anxiety that claimed her eyes. His teeth began to glint like a tiger preparing to take his first bite. ‘So I made my father an offer he couldn’t refuse,’ he slid in silkily—and followed her until his arm could rest against the wall near her head. ‘I said it was either done this way—’ he lifted the box close to her nose ‘—or I used less—conventional methods.’
‘There aren’t any.’
In reply he swooped on her mouth. She died for that kiss. Of course she did. ‘An illegitimate Bellini child is just not acceptable,’ he murmured as he drew away again. ‘My father saw my point and—’
‘You mean you threatened to make me pregnant?’ she gasped. Then her expression hardened. ‘Do you honestly think I would allow you to do that to me?’ His eyes began to gleam with a taunting message: You haven’t got the will-power to stop me.
But she had. On this point, if on no other, she had the power to say no to him. ‘A child isn’t a pawn, Marco,’ she said, stepping sideways and away from him. ‘You don’t play Russian roulette with its future just to win an argument.’
‘Is that the voice of experience?’ His expression had turned curious. She flashed him a wary look. ‘Anton Gabrielli,’ he announced. ‘And a cheque for a serious amount of lira. He was either paying off a mistress or buying your silence,’ he explained with a shrug. ‘And as I was sure you’ve only ever been my mistress, I came to the conclusion he was buying the silence. You won’t believe how good I felt about it.’
He might but she didn’t. She was seeing the glimmer of a chance at an old Italian name making the difference between unacceptable and acceptable. ‘I won’t acknowledge him as my father, you know,’ she warned him. ‘If he announced it to the world I would deny the charge. He will not be walking me down any church aisle just to make me respectable. And if he left me his millions, I would give them straight back again. So if this—’ she flicked an expressive hand at the ring box ‘—honour you are now prepared to bestow on me is built on those assumptions, you’re backing a losing horse here, Marco.’
‘His billions will go to his son and heir,’ he informed her levelly, and saw her flicker of surprise. ‘I see you didn’t know about him.’ Marco smiled. ‘Handsome guy. Likes the ladies. Plays the field with relish—much like his father did. Married,’ he added succinctly. ‘Two children—a boy and a girl. The wife lives with her father-in-law on their private estate on the island of Capri, while her husband enjoys himself elsewhere. As for the Gabrielli name, he can keep it since you will be taking the Bellini name. And if you don’t want him as a father, then fine.’ He shrugged. ‘Because I have one worthy of taking on that role for you. And, despite your natural opinion of both my parents, they are really quite nice people. Their biggest problem is that they love me too much. But in time I am hoping to spread that around a bit to other, newer members of the family.’
‘Your mother hates me—’
‘My mother,’ Marco took up. ‘Was so repentant when I saw her this afternoon that she wanted to come back to the apartment to tell you so. Fortunately—’ he grimaced ‘—I talked her out of it. Or she would have been witnessing her son’s complete downfall. Interested in that?’ he quizzed her softly.
Her eyes filled with guilty tears. Her mouth began to tremble. He wanted to kiss it until it was warm and red and too full of him to tremble ever again. Instead, he pocketed the ring. She watched him do it, and he was very pleased to see her eyes darken and the way she had to turn and walk away in an effort to hide her disappointment. She might make all the claims in the world about not wanting the ring, but she was lying; she wanted it almost as much as she wanted him.
But now she could wait. He had handled it badly anyway. And this was not the setting in which he preferred to commit himself to marriage. So they were leaving—now, he decided. Except first…
He spotted everything he required and went over to collect a sheet of brown paper and a roll of sticky tape. She was standing by the window, staring out on the kind of view of Milan that gave this scruffy room reason. Ignoring her, he went over to the nude portrait of himself and, with the efficiency of one who knew exactly how to handle an unframed canvas, he started to package it ready for transportation.
Glancing at him over her shoulder, she didn’t even attempt to protest at what he was doing other than to say quietly, ‘It isn’t finished.’
‘You may have all the time in the world to do so back at the apartment,’ he replied. Sticky tape screeched as he stretched it over brown paper. ‘We will convert one of the guest bedrooms into a studio.’ Sharp white teeth neatly sliced through the tape, long fingers smoothed it into place.
‘Marco—’
‘Is there anything you want to take with you now, or can the rest wait until we are more able to receive it?’ he cut in smoothly, then lifted the canvas down and finally looked at her.
Although the sunlight might be wearing the warmgold of the late afternoon, the way it touched her hair and her skin reminded him of her own self-portrait. But the expression in her eyes could have been her mother’s. Sad. It was sad. She didn’t believe there was any hope for them.
‘You came back, cara,’ he reminded her soberly. ‘But you did so to a new order of things. That order cannot be returned to what it used to be because you are afraid of what the change may mean.’
‘It can if you let it,’ she argued.
But he shook his dark head. ‘I no longer want what we used to have,’ he explained, so succinctly that Antonia had no choice but to understand his meaning.
Her eyes grew so dark that his heart hit his ribcage. It was obvious she saw the choice he was giving her—between leaving him again or facing their future with all its complications—as equal to standing between a black hole and oblivion.
But she had come back, he grimly reminded himself. It was the only thing that stopped him from going over there and promising her anything so long as she agreed to stay with him.
It was a strange sensation, this fear of losing her, he noted as his eyes—and his bluff—held firm. ‘Ready?’ he prompted.
She lowered her eyes, turned away, ran her fingers up her arms to her shoulders as if she was trying to hug something to her. Courage? The chill of fear? The love he knew she felt for him? The need to believe that he felt the same about her?
It was time she began trusting in that word ‘love’, he thought grimly. Time she began to trust him.
‘Yes, I’m ready,’ she said quietly.
Relief almost floored him. He had to turn away to grimace at the way his legs had just turned to nothing.
‘Let’s go, then.’ Still holding the painting, he went to collect her bit of luggage. As she approached he silently handed over her shoulder bag, then just as silently turned to the door.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE apartment had a hushed air about it after the taxi ride across the noisy city. A large flat brown card package leant against one of the walls with the Romano Gallery name printed on it. Marco went to place his new find beside it, then walked away down the hall and into their bedroom with her suitcase.
He was making some statement about ownership, Antonia recognised that as she followed him. Strange, then, that stepping into the one room where she’d always believed she truly belonged she should suddenly feel as if she was entering alien territory. Yet nothing had changed, the room looked exactly as it should do—if you didn’t count the absence of her few personal possessions.
Marco was already putting the case away in the cupboard. There was a statement in the way he did that, also, because the case had not been unpacked and he was shutting the door, turning the key in the lock and even went so far as t
o remove the key and pocket it.
Try running off with only what you came here with, now, the action yelled at her.
Unsure how to respond, Antonia was still considering her options when he came back towards her, shut the bedroom door with one hand and removed her bag from her shoulder with the other then simply let it drop. And every action was so deliberate that he set her nerve-ends tingling. Her hand was caught next. He used it to trail her behind him over to the window where he touched the switch that sent the vertical blinds sliding across the glass.
The room became shrouded in a soft half-light. Seduction suddenly eddied in the air. Turning her towards to him, he looked down at her, searched her whole face as if he had forgotten what it looked like, then sighed a small sigh.
‘Why the closed blinds?’ she asked him. He had never bothered to do that before.
‘Ambience,’ he replied. ‘A desire for your full attention,’ he added. ‘And the need to shut the rest of the world out while we remind each other what it was we almost lost.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Antonia said. ‘I—’
‘Don’t ever use those words to me again,’ he cut in harshly. ‘Especially not in English.’ He even shuddered. ‘They will always represent to me the coldest little goodbye a man could experience.’
He was talking about her text message. Her heart found her throat and blocked it as she gazed into his pain darkened blue-grey eyes. I’m sorry hovered on her lips again. She converted the words into a tender-sweet kiss meant to convey the meaning for her.
Pain-dark changed to passion-dark. ‘Si,’ he whispered in approval. The kiss was most definitely preferable to words for him.
So one tender kiss led to another, until tender became hungry and hunger converted itself into desire. Desire stripped clothes away in a slow precious reacquainting with what she had put at risk today.
This was it. All she needed, she told herself. This man looking at her like this, touching her like this—needing her like this. Anything else he cared to bestow was merely a bonus. Because she could feel the love emanating from him even though he had never said the words to her.
Exotic Affairs: The Mistress BrideThe Spanish HusbandThe Bellini Bride Page 48