Chloe couldn’t listen to another word. She stalked past her mother and out of the room. She’d have to find a member of the household staff and get directions to Marco’s room. She couldn’t do nothing and hope he didn’t take legal action.
The sounds of people laughing and talking drifted down the long hallway from the ballroom. Did they have any idea of the evil blackness occupying the space where Lidia’s conscience should reside? Maybe they did and they just didn’t care.
The party was in full swing. All these wealthy people carried on with their endless socialising, oblivious to the shattering ache of Chloe’s soul.
It was going to be hell to face Marco again, but it had to be done. Then she’d put the embarrassing scene with Lidia out of her head and forget all about him. Life would go on and she’d never have to face Marco Esposito’s scorn again.
Chapter Four
Marco stalked back through the Stewart’s palatial country house, determined to put as much distance as he could between himself and the women who were beneath his contempt. Castigating himself, he walked up the sweeping staircase that led to his guestroom in the wing opposite from the one where Chloe stayed.
The whole nightmare played out over and over in his head as he analysed every word, every detail.
Lidia Stewart was the most revolting woman he’d ever met. An amoral schemer whose eye was always on a chance to better her position of wealth, she was constantly trying to climb a few rungs higher up the ladder of society. It didn’t surprise him she’d hatched such a nefarious scheme and dangled her daughter at him like bait.
Oh, Chloe had been good. Even though she’d mentioned her mother, she hadn’t once let on she was Lidia’s daughter. Instead there’d been a pitiful story of having nothing in common with her mother and of planning to fly back to the United States.
Nothing in common?
Chloe Salvatore had much more in common with her mother than she’d have him believe.
Guilt accompanied his fury.
How could he have let himself believe, even for a second, that Chloe might be the one who was able to thaw his frozen heart? It was an insult to the woman he’d never stopped loving—a reminder that nobody could ever come close to living up to her standards.
It’d been disloyal of him to draw such a favourable comparison—to elevate the physical connection with Chloe over the years of trust he’d known with the woman he’d asked to become his wife.
The second he reached his room, he ripped off his shirt and threw it in the bin. It felt contaminated. What he needed was a shower to erase the feel of Chloe from his skin.
His plan to keep financial backers away from Barry Stewart this weekend needed to be revisited. He’d have to find another way to ensure Stewart didn’t get any financial help. Marco wouldn’t stay here a second longer knowing his whole sexual encounter with Chloe had been watched—and recorded.
Disgust washed through him once again.
He glared at his watch. Lidia had better get that footage to him in the next few minutes or he wouldn’t hesitate in calling the police, no matter how much scandal it created. A shudder ran through his frame. It was unbelievable that he, who guarded his privacy so zealously, could find himself in this position.
A knock sounded on the bedroom door.
Marco opened it and took an envelope from a maid. With a curt thank you, he closed the door and tore the envelope open. A USB dropped onto the carpet. No doubt it contained the video footage, but he couldn’t bring himself to look at it. Instead he picked it up, shoved it right to the bottom of his small suitcase and headed for the shower.
Soap and hot water might wash the taint of Chloe’s touch away from his body, but it was going to be a lot more difficult to banish her from his mind.
Christo! Tonight was the stuff of nightmares.
He’d only just turned the shower jet off when he heard another firm knocking on the door of his room. Grabbing a towel, he wrapped it around his waist and made for the door.
‘I know you don’t want me to be here, but I have to speak to you,’ Chloe blurted, the second the door was open.
‘There’s nothing more to say.’ He began closing the door when she caught him off guard and barged her way in.
Dio. Even knowing her deplorable character, he couldn’t help admiring her stormy beauty. In her determination, she was even more dangerously attractive.
‘I want you to listen to me,’ she pleaded. ‘I need you to believe that I didn’t have anything to do with Lidia’s scheme.’
Fool that he was, he wished he could believe it, but there was no denying the facts. ‘You deliberately let me have sex with you in the library knowing the cameras were rolling—even though I suggested we go to your room.’
She glared at him. ‘I’d never been into the library, and you knew the layout of the place far better than I did.’ She threw her hands up in the air dramatically. ‘I found you too damned sexy to resist and would’ve allowed you to lead me to a storeroom to have sex against the shelves.’
Much to his disgust, the mental image made his blood rush south.
‘Nothing had prepared me for the assault you waged on my senses,’ she continued, ‘and—to my utter shame—by the time you suggested going up to my room, I simply didn’t want to stop.’
Feeling completely on the back foot, he tried to pick holes in her case. ‘You told me it would be an unforgettable night, it has been—for all the wrong reasons.’
‘I’d thought it’d be unforgettable in a good way, not because my mother turned the whole damned thing into something sleazy that both of us would remember as our worst nightmare.’
She made valid points and made them fervently. The energy coming from her willed him to believe. Such a powerful performance may’ve fooled a less jaded man, but Marco had always known his title and his wealth made him a target for gold-diggers, and Chloe was the daughter of one of the biggest fortune hunters on the planet.
He stood his ground. ‘Your mother as good as announced you had sex with me at her bidding.’
‘Morality aside, why would I even contemplate doing such a thing? I hardly know the woman.’
So she claimed.
‘I think you should wake up and see the truth rather than blindly believing the lies of a woman you must know is twisted and malicious.’ She raised her hands and used one to tick points off the other fingers as she spoke again. ‘I met you. I was attracted to you. I had sex with you. There are the facts.’
‘You set out to blackmail me and reduced me to a porn star for the pleasure of perverted voyeurs.’ God, but it still ate into him like acid to know they’d been watched.
‘For God’s sake, Marco. How can you possibly imagine I’d want to be involved in any sexual encounter watched by others, let alone caught on tape?’
‘I assume this is one of Lidia’s more inventive schemes.’
She swayed and he noticed that even her lips were pale. He found himself taking a step closer to her, because under all her angry energy it hit him that she seemed weary to the point of collapse. But as he reached out to steady her, she stepped backwards, making it clear she wanted him to keep his distance.
That was fine with him. He hadn’t asked her to come here.
Railing at him as though he was the one who’d committed the crime, she demanded, ‘Have you ever stopped, even for the briefest of seconds, to imagine how mortified I am? It’s bad enough to have my mother burst in on us, but to learn she and the security guards sat there watching every second of it unfold. For her to stand there and applaud your sexual prowess, and then tell me I was woefully lacking in that department, is fairly soul-destroying.’
Woefully lacking? Hell, nothing could be further from the truth. What sort of angle was she trying to work now?
In the limited space she had available, she managed to take a couple more paces away from him while all the words tumbled out.
‘That’s my mother, Marco. She’s happy to exploit me in the same
way she wants to blackmail you. I flew to England thinking we might forge a relationship but she’s betrayed me in the cruellest possible way—she confessed to me after you left that it was always her intention to try to hook me up with somebody wealthy so they’d help Barry out of financial difficulty. What sort of mother does that?’ Her gorgeous dark hair caught his attention as she shook her head in agitation. ‘Now I’m scared witless you’ll proceed with charges against me for blackmail. Can you imagine the ramifications on my career? Do you even think for a second I’d be part of Lidia’s scheme and take such a risk when I’ve studied so long and worked so hard to establish my professional reputation?’
Do not react to her, he told himself. Keep your distance.
Raised a gentleman, every instinct urged him to reassure her he wasn’t about to press charges. But she was no damsel in distress. Chloe had been complicit in the threat against him.
‘Clearly the consequences of your actions are beginning to sink in, Counsellor. You have reason to be anxious.’
Every trace of colour bleached out of her skin. ‘You intend pressing charges against me?’
He should. She shouldn’t go unpunished. ‘I have the footage. I’m prepared to let the matter drop provided you never come near me again.’
‘Thank you.’ Her shoulders sagged. ‘Obviously you don’t believe I’m innocent and I’m sorry that what was a... that something special, ended so...’ Her hands moved in agitation as she tried to express herself. ‘Well, I’m sorry it ended this way between us.’
Silence stretched as she waited for his response. He held himself silent. There was nothing to say. What did she expect him to say?
‘Goodbye, Marco,’ she told him in a small voice, before she turned and walked toward the door.
It took enormous restraint to stop from calling out to her as she turned the handle and opened the door. He wouldn’t have thought he’d possess such irrationality, yet there was a huge part of him wanting to stop her—wanting to believe in her and drag her back inside the room and make love to her all over again.
Mercifully, logic and self-protective mechanisms activated and he stood statue-still as she walked out of his room and out of his life. It was only once the door closed that he unclenched his hands from the fists they’d formed at his sides.
For a moment he stood there looking at the door, feeling... hollow. Sapped of energy. Her departure had been unexpectedly abrupt. He’d expected her to try to continue to persuade him of her innocence, but instead she’d walked away.
It was what she’d told him she’d planned to do when he first met her at the party.
It was what she said she’d do after they’d had sex.
He’d been warned.
He just hadn’t been warned that she’d been part of a blackmail scheme.
It was an effort to move again; but five minutes later, thanks to his sheer determination not to let her affect him, he’d changed into clothes that didn’t hold the faintest hint of Chloe’s deceptively sweet perfume, and was in his top of the line Lamborghini Aventador, powering his way toward London. His security detail had needed to scramble to keep up with his movements.
As he depressed the accelerator pedal and let the engine roar, he cursed. He’d go mad if he kept turning tonight over and over in his head. The only memory he’d allow himself to take with him was the lesson that women were notoriously good at presenting themselves in exactly the way they thought he wanted to see them. It was a lesson well learnt and one he’d never forget.
No woman would ever take the place of the woman who should’ve been his wife.
Chapter Five
Six weeks later, Chloe was beyond miserable.
In a few hours, she’d be making her way to London for her flight home—if she could summon the energy to get on a train and make it to the airport. Meanwhile, she put her head over the toilet bowl and purged her stomach of more of its contents.
Two days ago she’d finally achieved her objective for remaining at the Stewart country estate and would’ve been home by now except there were no seats available on earlier flights.
Despite Lidia’s signature on the legal document promising to destroy all video footage, Chloe found her way to the security room the morning after the fateful night of the party, and spoke with Sid, an elderly security man. Sid hadn’t been on duty when the camera rolled, but he’d heard of the incident and was thoroughly outraged by her mother’s actions. He’d been as determined as Chloe to obtain and destroy every last one of the copies Lidia had ordered.
After a stern talking to from Sid, the other security guards had eventually agreed it was a low act and handed over the copies of the USB drives to Sid for destruction. It turned out another guard also had a copy and had left for Italy that morning for an extended holiday. It was only a couple of days ago that he’d returned to work, brought the footage with him to be destroyed and had sworn no other copies had been made.
Sid had found Lidia’s copy in a desk drawer in her personal study. If Lidia missed it, she hadn’t said anything.
It was a relief for Chloe to know her mother had no more leverage over her.
Now Chloe could finally put all this behind her and return to her uncomplicated life in California. Somehow she’d have to try to convince her father the trip had been okay, although one look at her would no doubt tell him it hadn’t been.
The harrowing events of her first night in England had taken their toll. Despite all the pep talks she’d given herself, Marco had not only been impossible to put from her mind during the day, but he’d haunted every one of her dreams.
Trying to be pragmatic, she reasoned she’d got what she’d wanted out of the night—a taste of all she’d been missing, an introduction to how incredible lovemaking could be.
Incredible.
Mind-blowing.
Addictive.
Hell. If Lidia hadn’t barged in and told her lies, Chloe and Marco would probably have spent the entire night making love. Perhaps they would’ve had one more day together in London, but then it would’ve all been over.
Unable to help herself, she’d looked him up on the internet. She’d known he was an incredibly successful CEO but she’d known nothing of his private life. From what she’d read, she couldn’t be further removed from his life in the rich and glamorous fast lane. She was nothing like the immaculately made-up women he was pictured with on the internet—nor did she want to be. She’d simply been the only single woman available to him that night.
There was no more to it than that.
There never had been and she’d known it from the outset.
Although she wished it hadn’t ended as it had, there was no point in having regrets. She should simply be grateful to the sexually skilled prince because now she knew what she’d been missing from her physical relationships. One day she would find the man she was meant to be with, and when she connected on the forever-after level with him, maybe love would add the extra dimension to the level of sex she now knew existed.
Thinking she had nothing left to throw up, she started raising herself up from her position in front of the toilet, then sank back down to her knees again as the room started to spin.
God, but she was tired. Every morning she awakened feeling thoroughly wrung out. As if that hadn’t been bad enough; now she’d gone and caught this incredibly virulent stomach bug, which had persisted for the last five days.
Perfect. She’d suffered so badly from motion sickness on the flight over, she’d expected more of the same on the return journey. Now this stomach bug guaranteed it because she wouldn’t even be able to keep a motion-sickness tablet down.
It’d been impossible to settle her stomach no matter how little she’d eaten or how bland the food, and she was getting so damned weak she’d taken herself off to a local doctor, who’d informed her there was a gastrointestinal virus going around and she needed to rest and keep hydrated.
No doubt stress wasn’t helping her recovery. Staying here
was a constant reminder of all that’d gone wrong. It was also delaying the stressful task she had ahead of her. She still wasn’t sure how she was going to break the news to her father that he wasn’t her biological father.
Part of her didn’t want to.
It would be easy to return, keep the status quo and pretend ignorance. An irritating little frisson of fear resided in the corner of her soul, demanding to know whether her relationship with Luis would still be the same.
She closed her eyes. Of course it’d be the same. The love she had for Luis Salvatore hadn’t diminished because she’d learned he wasn’t her biological father. He might feel betrayed initially, but only by Lidia. He wouldn’t blame Chloe. Besides, he’d always told her she was the most important thing in his life and her dad never lied.
But if it hadn’t been for his marriage to Lidia, and his ongoing feeling of responsibility for Chloe, maybe Luis would’ve married someone else and had a whole family to love?
The ensuite doorknob rattled.
‘Chloe?’
What the hell was her mother doing inside the cottage? Chloe had been fortunate enough to avoid Lidia completely since her mother had signed the document. She’d been told the Stewarts had flown off to Paris for a few weeks.
‘Go away,’ Chloe moaned. ‘You promised you wouldn’t come near me.’
‘The maid tells me you’re being sick. She said it’s been happening for the last five days.’
Convinced she had no stomach contents left to empty, Chloe forced herself to stand shakily, flushed the toilet and splashed her face with water in short, angry actions. Thankfully, the room no longer spun around her.
‘Have you had the maids spy on me?’ she demanded through the door.
‘Oh, darling. I’m concerned for your welfare.’
Yeah. Right. ‘It’s a little late to pretend to care now, Mommy Dearest.’ She didn’t bother to hide her hostility.
‘Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I care if you’re throwing up.’
Shelving her plans to clean her teeth straight away, Chloe unlocked the door and flung it open. Hands going to her hips, she injected her words with every bit of sarcasm she could muster. ‘Well, if you care, there must be something in it for you, and I can’t figure out how you’d profit from me having a stomach bug.’ Unless Lidia wanted Chloe to stay in England a little longer for some reason and thought the bug would keep her here?
The Irresistible Royal Page 7