by Неизвестный
Miranda Lee -The Blackmailed Bridegroom
CHAPTER ONE
The jumbo jet was twenty minutes late setting down at Mascot Airport, but Antonio was one of the first to alight. The head of Fortune Productions, European Division, didn't look as if he'd been on a gruelling twenty-two-hour flight from London to Sydney. His superb grey suit was sleek and uncrumpled. His thick jet-black hair was slicked back from a freshly shaven face. His dark eyes were clear and rested. The advantage of flying first class.
Not that Antonio Scarlatti had always travelled first class. He knew what it was like to do it tough. He knew what it was like to travel long hauls cramped in steerage, with wall-to-wall passengers and little chance of sleep, then have people look down their nose at him at the other end, when his suit had been wrinkled and his job far less prestigious than the one he now held.
Antonio had no intention of ever going back to that existence. He'd made it to the top, and the top was where he was going to stay. The world was for the winners. And the wealthy. At the age of thirty-four, he was finally both.
The company limousine was waiting in its usual spot, the engine idling at the ready. Antonio opened the back door and slid into its air-conditioned comfort.
'Morning, Jim,' he addressed the chauffeur.
'Mornin', Tone.'
Antonio smiled. He was back in Australia all right. In London, and all over Europe, he was always addressed by his drivers as 'Mr. Scarlatti'. But that wasn't the way down under, especially after an acquaintance of some time.
Antonio leant back against the plush leather seat with a deeply relaxing sigh. It was good to be home and off the merry-go-round for a fortnight's break. His contract stated he could fly home for two weeks rest and recuperation every three months, a necessity since he worked seven days a week when on the job. Being in charge of selling and promoting Fortune Productions' extensive list of television programmes to the hundreds of stations and cable networks all over Europe was a challenging job.
'Straight home, Jim,' he said, and closed his eyes. He'd bought himself a luxury serviced apartment overlooking the harbour bridge a couple of years back, and couldn't wait to immerse himself in its privacy and comfort. The last few days had been a nightmare of negotiations and never-ending meetings. Antonio needed some peace and quiet.
'No can do, Tone,' the chauffeur returned as he eased the lengthy car past the long line of taxis which had queued up to meet the flight from London. 'The boss wants you to join him for breakfast.'
Antonio's eyes opened on a low groan. He hoped it wasn't one of those media circus breakfasts Conrad was always getting invited to and which he occasionally attended. Antonio couldn't stand them at the best of times. 'Where, for pity's sake?' came his irritable query.
'The Taj Mahal.'
"Thank God,' Antonio muttered.
The Taj Mahal was Jim's nickname for Conrad Fortune's residence at Darling Point. It was an apt term. The place was over the top with its grandeur. A monolithic mansion sprawled across an acre of some of the most expensive land in Sydney's exclusive Eastern suburbs.
What the house lacked in taste, it made up for in sheer size. The facade had more columns than the Colosseum, the foyer more marble than the British Museum, and Romanesque statues and ornate fountains dominated the front landscaping. The sloping backyard was more low key, terraced to incorporate the solar-heated swimming pool and two rebound ace tennis courts.
Antonio thought the place ostentatious in the extreme. But it was impressive, no doubt about that. Socialites grovelled to be included on the lists for Conrad's celebrated parties. Magazines and television programmes clamoured to photograph beyond the high-security walls which enclosed the property.
Not Conrad's television programmes, of course. They knew better.
'You wouldn't have any idea what he wants me for, Jim, would you?' Antonio probed.
'Nope.' A man of few words, Jim.
Antonio decided not to speculate. Time would tell, he supposed.
Fifteen minutes later, the limousine slid to a smooth halt in front of the grand front steps, and this time Jim did the honours with the door.
'You won't be needing that,' he advised when Antonio went to pick up his laptop.
Antonio shot the chauffeur a sharp look. So he did have some idea of what was up. And clearly it wasn't a business matter.
Curiouser and curiouser.
The housekeeper answered the door. Evelyn was in her late forties, and very homely, as were all of Conrad's female employees. No fool, was Conrad. He'd been stung once, by an ambitious and beautiful maid.-and had no intention of harbouring any females under his roof who might present him with unwise temptations. Although now rising seventy, Conrad was still very interested in the opposite sex, as evidenced by the three mistresses he kept. One here in Sydney, one in Paris and one in the Bahamas.
Evelyn had been Conrad's housekeeper now for over a decade. She was efficient and reliable. More importantly, she knew how to keep her mouth shut to the press.
'Conrad's expecting you,' she told Antonio straight -away. 'He's in the morning room.'
The morning room overlooked the terrace, which overlooked the pool. The floor-to-ceiling windows faced north-east, and captured the sun all year round. On a winter morning, the room was a dream. In summer, the air-conditioning had a tough job preventing the place from turning into a hothouse. Spring found it coolish, especially since the sun was only just rising at six-thirty.
Conrad was sitting at the huge glass oval table in the centre of the conservatory-style room, wrapped in a thick navy bathrobe. Despite his age, he still had a full head of hair-a magnificent silvery grey-and piercing blue eyes. They flicked up at Antonio's entrance, and raked him from head to toe, disconcerting Antonio for a moment. Why on earth was Conrad looking him over like that, as though he'd come to audition for one of his soap operas? What was going on here?
'Sit down, Antonio,' Conrad ordered. 'Take a load off your feet and have some decent coffee for a change.' He picked up the coffee pot and poured an extra mugful of steaming brown liquid.
'What's the problem?' Antonio asked as he sat down and pulled the coffee towards him. His employer gave him another long, considering look over the table, and Antonio's gut tightened further. He knew, without being told, that he wasn't going to like what Conrad had to say.
'Paige has come home again, ' came the abrupt announcement.
Antonio almost said, So? What's new?
Conrad's wild and wilful daughter had been running away from home regularly since she was seventeen. She turned up again regularly too, every year or so. But no sooner had she returned than she'd be off again, saying she was going to share a flat with some girlfriends. But only once had this been the case. Usually, when the private investigator's report came in several weeks later, her flatmate was male and good-looking, invariably an artist or a musician. Paige seemed to like creativeness. Not one of them had denied sharing more with Paige than the cooking.
At first, Conrad had worried Paige might be exploited for her money. A whole family could have lived comfortably on his only child's generous monthly allowance! But perversely, from the day she'd first left home, Paige had never touched a cent of the thousands deposited in her bank account every month. When Conrad had found out his money was being donated to the RSPCA, and that Paige was working to support herself, he'd stopped the allowance altogether.
'Let her work, if that's what she wants to do!' he'd raged to Antonio, but would still cringe when he learnt that she was working as a waitress in some cafe, or behind the bar in a club or pub.
His worst nightmare, however, was that Paige would fall pregnant to one
of her live-in boyfriends and then bring the baby home with her. Conrad was not large on babies. Which gave Antonio an idea.
'She's not pregnant, is she?' he asked.
'No, but she's going to come to a sticky end, that girl, unless I do something about it. Do you realize she turns twenty-three next week?'
Antonio was surprised. How the years had flown!
'I would imagine you've tried everything, ' he said sincerely. Most girls would give their eye-teeth for what Paige had once had. A lovely home. Designer clothes., An allowance fit for a princess, if she'd wanted to claim it. If none of that was enough to keep her happy, and at home, then Lord knows what was!
'Not... everything, ' Conrad said slowly, and he set those penetrating blue eyes on Antonio again. "There's one thing I haven't tried. '
'And what's that?'
'Marriage, ' he pronounced. 'To a man who could control her. '
Antonio couldn't help it. He laughed. 'You think Paige would marry a man of your choice?'
'Of course not. I was thinking of a man of her choice. Namely, you, Antonio. '
'Me?' Antonio was floored.
'Yes, you. Don't pretend, Antonio. I know exactly what happened just before Paige ran away from home that first time. The first thing Lew did when I put him on the job of tracing her was to question all the staff here at Fortune Hall. Did you think that little incident by the pool between you and my daughter hadn't been overheard?'
When Antonio opened his mouth to explain, Conrad waved it shut.
'Please don't bother to defend your actions, ' he swept on. 'You have nothing to answer for. You did exactly the right thing. How were you to know that the silly little fool would take your rejection so badly and run off with her broken heart?'
'Her heart wasn't broken, ' Antonio contested heatedly. 'She took up with the next fellow soon enough!'
'A girl rarely forgets her first love. '
'I was never her love, first or otherwise!'
Hell, he hadn't even kissed the girl. He'd been polite to her when she'd been at home on holiday from boarding school, making small talk when their paths had crossed. Hard not to run into her when he'd been living at Fortune Hall in his position as Conrad's personal assistant, his first job with the company. No one had been more surprised than him when she'd thrown herself into his arms that day by the pool and declared her undying love and devotion.
Antonio hadn't taken advantage of her schoolgirl crush, despite acknowledging she was a serious temptation to any man, especially dressed as she'd been that day, in a minute pink bikini. On top of that, Antonio was always physically attracted to blond women. He especially liked tall, slender blond women, with big blue eyes, high, full breasts and a waist his hands could span.
His hands had spanned Paige's waist that day, as he'd reluctantly put her aside, then told her in no uncertain terms that he didn't return her feelings and that he thought of her as a silly little girl.
Not strictly true, of course. He'd thought of her as a silly big girl, extremely beautiful and extraordinarily sexy. Some evenings, when she'd been home from school and she'd come down to dinner in one of those tight, short low-cut little dresses she'd favoured, he'd been glad to be sitting at a table with a serviette covering his lap. If Paige had been any other man's daughter things might have turned out differently by the pool that day. But Antonio had had no intention of losing a second job because of the boss's daughter. No way!
Perhaps his rejection had been a little rough. Paige's obvious humiliation and tears had caused him pangs of guilt for a while, especially when she'd run away instead of returning to school, not sitting for her final exams into the bargain.
He'd got over his guilt soon enough, however, when Lew, Conrad's personal private investigator, had found her less than a month later, living on a remote North Coast beach with some surfing bum a good few years older than herself. Since the shack they'd been sharing , only had one bedroom, it wasn't difficult to conclude their relationship had been far from platonic. She certainly hadn't denied it when Antonio himself had travelled all the way up there and tried to bring her back at Conrad's request.
Antonio's male ego had been dented by her indifferent reaction to his arrival on her doorstep, but any lingering concern for the girl had been well and truly dispelled once he'd seen for himself what sort of life she'd chosen to live.
Paige was trouble, in his opinion, an opinion reinforced every time their paths crossed, which thankfully wasn't often. The last time he'd seen her had been at Conrad's Christmas party the previous year. She'd sashayed downstairs, wearing a short strapless red dress which might have ended up around a less shapely females' ankles, so precariously had it been perched. To his eternal irritation and frustration, Antonio had found himself wanting to sweep her back up the stairs, rip that infernal scrap of red satin from her body and ravage her senseless upon the first available bed. Or floor. Or whatever.
Instead, he'd had to forcibly keep his eyes away from Paige's luscious young flesh, pretending to be enraptured by his date, a female lawyer on Fortune Productions' payroll. To his discredit, Antonio had shamelessly used the woman-both at the party and later-to sate the dark desires Paige had evoked.
Not that she'd minded. As it had turned out, she'd liked her sex a little rough, and without strings.
He hadn't seen Paige since that night, and tried not to think of her at all these days. But he was certainly thinking of her now.
'You can't be serious about this, Conrad, ' he said dis-believingly.
'I'm very serious. '
'It's a crazy idea!'
'Why? She was in love with you once, whether you like it or not. And that was before you developed into the man you are today. Do you think I haven't noticed the way women react to you? You could make any woman fall in love with you. A girl like Paige should be a cinch. '
'But I don't want Paige to fall in love with me, ' he pointed out icily. 'And I don't want to marry her. ' Her, least of all, he thought angrily.
'Why?'
Antonio did not feel like explaining that he'd been in love very deeply once, with the daughter of his previous boss. He'd thought Lauren had loved him as much as he'd loved her. But when push had come to shove she hadn't been prepared to actually marry an Italian migrant with a questionable background and nothing to his name but his modest salary as a wine salesman. She'd just been slumming for a while, before moving on from her cosy, cushy life as a rich man's daughter to the cosy, cushy life of a rich's man's wife.
He'd stupidly turned up at her house on the night of her engagement party and made a big scene. Naturally, he'd been given the sack, with no references. It had been several months before he'd been able to get another job, during which he'd practically had to eat the paint off the walls. When Conrad had hired him to be his assistant and interpreter he'd been eternally grateful, even though he suspected he'd been the only applicant who could speak the five languages Conrad required during his business trips overseas.
Antonio had worked his guts out to get where he was today. He had no intention of giving it up for anyone, or of sharing his life with the same sort of silly, selfish, shallow creature who'd once almost destroyed him.
'When and if I marry, Conrad, ' he said with cold fury, 'it will be because I'm so much in love that I couldn't bear not to. Which was about as likely as Conrad himself breasting the altar once more.
When his boss said nothing to this, Antonio's black eyes narrowed. 'If I don't agree with this plan of yours, is it going to cost me my job?'
'No, of course not!' Conrad denied expansively. 'What kind of man do you take me for?'
Antonio hesitated to say. But you didn't get to be one of the richest men in Australia by being full of the milk of human kindness. Over the six years in Conrad's employ, Antonio had gleaned a lot of information about his boss.
Conrad had started out with nothing, as the son of penniless Polish migrants, changing his name from
Fortuneski to Fortune and getting
in on the ground floor with television in Australia when it had started, in the fifties, working behind the camera at first before forming his own production company and buying the Australian rights to a successful American game show. It had made him his first million. More game shows had followed, and more millions. Then, in the late sixties, he'd tried one of the first soaps made in Australia, an outrageously sexy series which had made its name with scandalous storylines. Serious millions had begun to roll in, and Fortune Productions had never looked back. Neither had its ambitious bachelor owner.
Conrad had lived and breathed his work, and had had no intention of getting married. But then, in his mid-forties, Conrad had made the mistake of giving his then housekeeper cane blanche to hire and fire staff, and she'd taken on Paige's mother to serve at table. During a misguided interlude after a rather lengthy and boozy dinner party, Paige had been conceived.
Once presented with the reality of a child-to-be, Conrad had done the right thing and married the woman. He'd been hoping for a son and heir to take over the business. Instead, Paige had been born.