Billionaire Brides: An Anthology

by Connelly, Clare

  She heard the motorbike’s engine cut out only a few seconds before the knock at the door, and she knew who it would be. Shame curdled her belly – shame at having left Nico without a note, an explanation. But what could she have said? What would she say now?

  She took a sip of her wine then placed the glass on the small coffee table, standing to move back inside, through the living area, towards the front door. And even though she was sure it was him, her survival instincts had been irrevocably honed by her experiences. “Who is it?”

  A pause. “Nico.”

  Her heart leapt. Her pulse fired. “Hang on.”

  She sucked in a deep breath, checked her appearance in the mirror then unlocked the door, pulling it inwards.

  Heaven help me. He was wearing a black leather jacket over his denims. The motorbike helmet hung loose from one hand and in the other, he held her yellow hat. His expression was quizzical.

  She immediately felt foolish. So foolish.

  “Hey.” She cleared her throat and offered a half-smile.

  “You forgot something.” He held the hat out to her.

  She took it, her pulse racing for reasons she couldn’t comprehend. Desire, certainly. Fear? Not of Nico, but of his connection to her past? Definitely. But didn’t that make Nico yet another part of her life that Michael was seeking to control? A pleasurable activity she was denying herself because she was afraid of her asshole ex?

  “And I have your coat,” she nodded to the hooks just inside the door.

  “So you do.” He lifted both brows and her heart skipped a beat. “Was that your plan? I must say, as far as heists go, the quarry leaves a little to be desired.”

  It was a joke and she smiled, even when she felt a chasm of uncertainty, and an instinctive need to pull back from him. “I thought about taking the Pavona near the door,” she tilted her head to the side in an imitation of thoughtfulness. “But you know, who wants world class art when there’s a woollen coat on offer?”

  “Indeed.” His eyes narrowed then, his expression taking on a serious quality. “You couldn’t wait for your clothes to dry?”

  “I…”

  What? This was a moment of truth, a time for her to decide what she wanted to say to him. Except she couldn’t. Words failed her.

  “Mind if I come in?”

  It was simply a matter of extending the same courtesy to him that he’d rendered her earlier that day. He was getting wet and inside her home it was warm and dry. But he was so enormous – his personality, his essence, his everything – that once he’d breached the door to this cosy little villa she suspected it would never feel quite the same again.

  So? She challenged herself. She’d survived worse than that. Did she think she wasn’t strong enough to conquer his presence? Or did she think he wouldn’t already be in her mind after what they’d shared? Keeping him out in the rain wasn’t just silly, it was downright rude.

  “Of course not,” she waved a hand into the space, opening the door a little wider.

  She’d been right. The second he entered, he dominated everything. The air, the space, the light. It was all Nico Montebello. Her mouth felt acrid, her temperature increasing.

  “You walked out on me.”

  “I…” she swallowed, a frown forming on her face. “Yeah, I did.”

  He turned to face her slowly, his sentiments impossible to fathom. She was drowning in the ocean-blue depths of his eyes, and there was no lifeline in sight. “Why?”

  Such a simple question, with no answer she could possibly give.

  “I panicked,” she offered, after a moment’s hesitation. When in doubt, tell as close to the truth as possible. “I…wasn’t expecting to meet anyone. Here. In Italy. That’s not why I came.” She swallowed, trying to focus her mind. But Michael was there, his handsome face in her eyes when she blinked, so she shuddered a little. “I got out of a relationship a few months ago.”

  Nico frowned. “So?”

  “I’m not ready to complicate that. I shouldn’t have…I mean, it was…this afternoon was…really…mind-blowing,” she said with a small smile. He returned it and her tummy exploded with butterflies and unicorns and rainbows.

  “It was.” His swift agreement kicked up her pulse another notch.

  She rushed on. “But I shouldn’t have let it happen.”

  His expression showed a hint of frustration.

  “I mean, I wanted it to happen. I just should have known better.”

  “Are you still in love with this man?”

  “Which man?”

  “The bad break up?”

  “Oh, God, no,” she blanched.

  There was a pause as he digested this. “So you’re going to be celibate for the rest of your life?”

  “Um, no. I guess not.”

  “And it was how many months ago?”

  “Six. Almost seven.”

  “And yet you think having sex with someone else is somehow wrong?”

  She heard it and knew how silly that was. “It’s just…not why I’m here,” she repeated, aware of how lame it sounded.

  “So you don’t want to see me again?”

  She was completely floored.

  “That’s why you crept out? Leaving only this rather beautiful hat?” He gestured towards the door.

  Heat stained her cheeks. “Do you want to see me again?”

  His expression shifted, something like doubt clouding his eyes for a moment but then his response was swift and concise. “Apparently.”

  She stared at him, words not immediately coming to her. “But…why?”

  He laughed, a deep, throaty sound that was so attractive it curled her toes. It had been so long since she’d heard a laugh like that – simple and lined with pleasure. A laugh that didn’t spark fear because she knew it would never last long enough.

  He took a step towards her and she held her ground, wanting him to touch her, needing to feel his skin on hers even when that made zero sense.

  What was she doing? This was madness. It didn’t matter what he said, nor what he wanted.

  “I can’t.” Now she did take a step away from him, wrapping her arms around her torso.

  “You don’t want to?”

  “I want…” She bit down on her lip. “What are you saying? What do you want?”

  “More of what we did today.” His response was instant.

  Her pulse trembled. “Sex?”

  “Yeah. Great sex.” He paced across the room, towards the terrace. Belatedly she recalled her glass of wine. He stared out at the view, the darkness of the night, the lashing of rain, and was quiet for so long she wondered if he’d decided not to finish the conversation.

  “I come to Ondechiara every summer.”

  Ice filled her veins as she recalled the fact Michael had told her as much.

  “I never stay longer than September first and I won’t this year. But while I’m here and while you’re here, why shouldn’t we see each other?” He turned to face her, and there was something in his face she recognised and instinctively understood, because she felt it too. Hesitation. I don’t trust easily.

  “Just for the next few weeks?” She prompted, feeling her way in this as much as he was.

  “Si, absolutely.” He angled his body back to hers. “I don’t do relationships, Maddie. I’m not interested in anything beyond casual sex. It’s important that you understand that from the outset, because I’d hate to hurt you.”

  “You wouldn’t.” Her eyes sparked to his. “I mean, I don’t want a relationship either.” And not with this man! If it weren’t for their connection through Michael, she’d likely feel completely differently. But it was too complicated, too entangled.

  “Then it’s simple.”

  “It’s not,” she shook her head, but how could she explain? How could she tell him what she’d been through and at whose hands?

  “Did you enjoy sleeping with me?”

  Heat rushed her face. “Yes.”

  Pleasure showed i
n his eyes. “Do you want to sleep with me again?”

  Hell, yes. She swallowed back her instant response. “It’s not that easy.”

  “Why not?”

  Great question; how to answer it? She knew she couldn’t tell him about Michael. And admitting that to herself showed her how much she did, in fact, want to keep doing what they started that afternoon. Because if she didn’t want more time with Nico, why wouldn’t she just throw the truth at him? It was a solid reason for avoiding any further encounters.

  And yet…

  “You had a bad break up?”

  She nodded slowly.

  “So let me help you forget the bastardo who hurt you,” he grinned, closing the distance between them. “Let me make love to you over and over again until you barely remember his name…”

  How tempting it was! Especially when he brought his body to hers and took a step forward, pushing her against the wall so she was trapped within the strength of his frame.

  He was going to kiss her and she was desperate for that, but before he did, she needed to make some kind of sense of this. Because her head and body were completely at war with one another. The smart thing to do was to run, far away from Nico at least, if not from Ondechiara. But there was her body, her heart, her desires. She wanted him simply for him, but it was more than that. Didn’t she deserve this? Michael had taken so much from her and here was a man who was offering her a few weeks of blissful, heady, no-strings fun. Why shouldn’t she enjoy that? No strings, just light-hearted, mind-blowingly sexy fun…

  Because there was risk there, the kind of risk she’d worked hard to free herself from. Could she mitigate that?

  “I would have rules.”

  His smile made her tummy twist. “Bene. What are they?”

  “No one could know about this.” She fixed him with a steely gaze. “I mean, no one.”

  “Besides Dante, who else would I tell?”

  “Who’s Dante?” Alarm bells sounded in her brain.

  “My dog.”

  “You have a dog?”

  A growling noise of assent. “He hides during storms. If you’d stayed around longer, you’d have met him.”

  She lifted her hand and punched him playfully but he caught her fist and lifted it to her lips, kissing her lightly so her stomach swirled.

  “Fine, other than Dante, you don’t tell anyone and nor do I,” she murmured.

  “Do you think I plan to shout our affair from the rooftops?”

  His reference to their ‘affair’ spread goose bumps over her body, because it spoke of such a foregone conclusion. “My ex is…it’s so complicated. I prefer to keep my private life very, very private.”

  “Me too.” He nodded crisply. “Consider it done.”

  What else? “It can only be this summer.” Even as she spoke the words she felt regret fold around her. In another time and place, if he hadn’t been connected to Michael, if she hadn’t still been discovering her sense of independence after having lost herself completely to an over-controlling partner, she would have hated putting a time limit on this. But Michael made anything else impossible. “I mean it, Nico. I have a life in England I have to get back to at some point.” The very idea sent a sharp spear of dread through her. London was so full of Michael, so full of memories. But she missed home. She missed her parents, her dad. Her friends, who she’d completely disappeared from out of a need for self-preservation.

  “Cara?” He captured her face in the palms of his hands, holding her still for his inspection. “I promise you, I do not want more than I’ve offered. Today was fun, si?”

  “Si,” she repeated, nodding.

  “So let us have more fun, and the moment we stop enjoying it, we end it. No hard feelings, no strings, no commitments, no promises we can’t keep. Bene?”

  Her brain was shouting at her to see sense, to see reason, but Nico was standing right in front of her in his wet leather jacket, so impossibly sexy, like some kind of Greek God brought to life purely for her enjoyment.

  Seeing clearly was over-rated, anyway.

  Chapter 4

  HE WATCHED AS SHE poured him a wine. Her movements were so graceful, her fingers deft in their manipulations. He leaned against the doorjamb and smiled. He hadn’t been lying. He didn’t trust easily, and never would, but he liked the company of women and Maddie was not like the women he generally knew.

  He couldn’t put his finger on any difference in particular – he’d enjoy discovering them as he got to know her better – but there was an indefinable quality that fascinated him and had, if he was honest, from the minute he’d seen her windswept body on the top of the cliff near his home.

  After they’d slept together, he’d fallen asleep. He hadn’t meant to, but the moment had been so blissful, the room so dark, his body so completely satiated, her breathing so soporific. Waking up to discover her gone had wrenched him from that satisfied state though. He’d walked through the house, going from room to room, presuming she might have gone in search of a bathroom, or some food or water, but after fifteen minutes, he’d accepted the fact she was, in fact, gone. Her missing clothes had cemented that realisation. Only she’d left her hat, and just the sight of it on the hook near the front door had filled him with a burning sense to see her again, even if only to understand why she’d bolted.

  He’d come here only intending to ask her for an explanation, to say ‘goodbye’ and finish their encounter more satisfyingly. He didn’t like loose ends. But the same drugging sense of desire had rushed his body when she’d pulled the door of La Villetta open and the proposal of a casual summer affair had been issued from his lips before he’d really known what he was saying. Even with these boundaries in place, it was more than Nico generally offered a woman. A week tended to be the sum total of the time he spent with any one lover. It wasn’t arbitrary; it was simply how his body worked. He got to know a woman and moved on. No hard feelings, just like he’d said to Maddie.

  But this wasn’t going to be an intense affair. They’d see each other occasionally – when the need overtook them, when it suited, just for this one summer.

  It was actually unexpectedly kind of perfect.

  “Are you hungry?” She shifted her gaze to his, her eyes feline and beautiful.

  “I am always hungry.” He grinned and saw the way she responded, desire sparking in her expression.

  “Me too.” Her smile was captivating. Some people smiled with their lips but Maddie seemed to smile with her whole body. It overtook her completely so warmth burst from her soul.

  “Let me see what you have.”

  “What for?”

  “To cook for you.”

  “You’re going to cook…for me?”

  “Sure. This surprises you?”

  “Erm, yeah. Kind of.”

  “Why?”

  “You just don’t exactly scream ‘give me an apron’.”

  He laughed. “Gender stereotyping?”

  “More like powerful-billionaire stereotyping,” she corrected with a small shake of her head. “Don’t you run one of the biggest companies in the world or something?”

  She hadn’t known who he was earlier, but he’d told her his last name and now she did. Did that change things for him? No. Everyone knew he was a Montebello. That was nothing new. But he did have to admit he’d liked the anonymity her lack of knowledge had initially provided. His financial circumstances changed things. It had to. He was one of the wealthiest people in the world – there weren’t many people who could fail to be impressed by that.

  “I run a sixth of it,” he murmured in agreement, moving to the fridge, pulling open the doors. Ciabatta, garlic, tomatoes. He turned to face her and caught her eyes staring at his rear. He grinned to himself, but to Maddie, he made a tsking sound. “You shouldn’t store tomatoes in the fridge, Maddie. You’re in Italy now.”

  It was like her smile had been forcibly smothered. Her eyes assumed a look of something he could only describe as fear and an apology flew fr
om her lips. “I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

  “I’m joking,” he rushed to reassure her. But her contrite statement was confusing and unsettling. She reminded him again of Dante, when he’d first taken the stray dog in. “You can store your tomatoes anywhere you want. But they are better when warmed by the sun and daylight.” He pulled all the tomatoes from the fridge, placing them on the table, purposefully not looking at her as he arranged them, because he wanted to give her a moment to compose herself. He wasn’t sure why she’d have such a strong reaction to a simple joke but she had, and he instinctively knew that she didn’t want him to read too much into it. He shelved it for later analysis and pretended he hadn’t registered her overreaction.

  “What are you making?” Sure enough, her voice sounded almost normal afterwards, only to Nico’s ears, there was an overbrightness to it that showed him she was still a little affected by his comment.

  “Pappa al Pomodoro,” he lifted his eyes to hers, infusing his smile with warmth and reassurance. “Have you ever had it?”

  She shook her head. “But really, you don’t have to cook…”

  “I want to.” He stepped around the kitchen bench, bringing his body to hers, wanting to erase the last remnant of stress that filled her eyes. He pressed his forehead to hers, breathing her in. “I like to cook. And I like the idea of cooking for you.”

  “You’ll let me help?”

  “I’ll let you sing for your supper,” he corrected. “Your job,” he reached for her hips and lifted her with ease, placing her on the bench top. “Is to entertain me with stories. Understood?”

  “Got it.”

  “And tell me where things are,” he tacked on, pressing a kiss to her lips, standing in between her legs. It was a mistake. Kissing her made his body instantly crave more, and he felt the same desire swamp her. Her arms lifted and wrapped around his neck, her fingertips tangling in his hair, her breathing erratic.

  He pulled away from her while he still could, because nearness was dangerous, temptation overwhelming. “Chopping board?”

  “Over there.” Her words were husky. He smiled as he turned away, sure that it wouldn’t be long before they indulged this mutual desire. And there’d be no running away afterwards.