Payment in Love

by Penny Jordan

  Like a sleep-walker, she went into the hall.

  ‘Kyle, I’m here.’

  For a moment she thought he hadn’t heard her, and then he stopped and turned. ‘Oh, my God, are you all right?’

  She was standing at the bottom of the stairs when he reached her, and she could feel his whole body shuddering as he wrapped his arms around her.

  ‘Heather, Heather, you little fool. Were you really so desperate to escape from me? How many have you taken?’

  She stepped back from him. He shook her violently.

  ‘How many, Heather, damn you? Oh God, I don’t know if I can go through this again! Once in one lifetime’s enough for any man. Come with me.’

  He was dragging her towards the door before she managed to speak.

  ‘Kyle, please stop. I haven’t done anything. I’m not trying to escape from you.’ She glanced into the sitting-room and saw the spilled tablets. ‘Oh, heavens, I forgot about those. I’d better pick them up.’

  ‘You forgot?’

  She heard the tormented sound of his voice, and knew then exactly what he had feared. Her own face went almost white as his.

  ‘You thought that I…?’ Her eyes rounded with shocked realisation. ‘Oh, Kyle, no…Mrs Evans hasn’t been sleeping. I gave her two. They spilled out of the bottle. You surely didn’t think that I…?’

  ‘Why not?’ he accused roughly. ‘You did it once before.’

  ‘That was a mistake!’ Her anguished cry silenced them both. They faced each other like two adversaries.

  ‘You try to end your own life and almost succeed, and you call that a mistake? For God’s sake, Heather, have you any idea how I felt that night when I came back and found you; when I realised that if I hadn’t… Have you any idea of what it did to me to know that I was the one who had driven you to that state?’ He shook his head, as though trying to ward off bad memories.

  ‘And now I’m doing it again,’ he said savagely. ‘God, when will I learn that I can’t make you love me, that just because you gave yourself to me physically it doesn’t mean…’ He shook his head again.

  ‘It was because of what I said about the child, wasn’t it?’ he demanded quietly. ‘You couldn’t bear the thought of being married to me, of bearing my child, and so instead…’

  ‘I did what, Kyle? Took half a bottle of sleeping tablets?’ She shook her head vehemently. ‘No way! Do you think I haven’t learned from my mistakes, too? Do you think I don’t have the intelligence to realise how stupid I was? You say you love me.’ Her voice shook over the words she had still not fully allowed herself to believe. ‘Maybe you do, but you don’t seem to know me very well. You’re confusing me with a seventeen-year-old spoilt child.’

  ‘What are you trying to tell me?’

  He seemed to have recovered some of his familiar self-control; his face was still white and strained, but that blazing look of agony was gone from his eyes.

  ‘I’m trying to tell you that I have too much respect for myself as a person to do anything so foolish.’

  ‘But you hated the thought of being tied to me,’ he challenged. ‘Don’t deny it, I saw it in your eyes.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said gravely. ‘I hated the thought of being tied to you for the sake of a child I suspect I haven’t even conceived.’

  He frowned, started to speak and then checked himself. ‘What is it you’re telling me, Heather?’

  ‘You say you love me. Hasn’t it occurred to you that if you’d told me that the night we made love that…that it might have made it easier for me to admit my feelings for you, instead of having to try so desperately to conceal them?’

  ‘Your feelings for me?’ He seemed almost stupefied. ‘But you hate me! That’s why I never told you…’

  ‘Told me what?’ she asked sharply, as he broke off with a muttered curse, dark colour tinging his cheeks.

  ‘That your father’s operation could have been performed as an emergency case by the National Health Service. That you could have managed after a fashion without my help. Your mother had begun to make the arrangements before I came on the scene, but she agreed to let me…take over. I wanted to do more than pay for the operation, you see; I wanted to give your parents the security they once gave me. And, incidentally, to have an excellent reason to see you every day. And it didn’t work, did it? I compromised with my conscience to make you grateful to me, but nothing could change the fact that you hate me.’

  ‘Do I?’ she said wryly. ‘Is that why I go up in flames every time you come anywhere near me? Is that why I’ve never wanted any other man to make love to me? Is that why I almost wish I was having your child? Oh, Kyle,’ she protested, torn between tears and laughter as he grabbed hold of her, running his hands over her body as though he couldn’t believe she was real.

  ‘Six years,’ he breathed shakily at last. ‘For six years I’ve dreamed of hearing you say something like this, and now that you are I don’t think I can believe it. I thought you hated me.’

  ‘So did I until quite recently, but I knew even before we made love that I was wrong. Kyle!’

  ‘Don’t talk,’ he muttered thickly against her mouth. ‘Kiss me instead.’

  It was a long time before he released her.

  ‘I would have helped your parents anyway, you know,’ he told her rawly, still holding on to her. ‘I love them, Heather, but I kept away for…’

  ‘For my sake…yes, I know,’ she agreed quietly. ‘It hurt me very badly to have to admit that to myself, Kyle, and to have to admit that it was because of me that my parents deprived themselves of sharing their lives with you.’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about the past. Let’s talk about the future. Our future. You will marry me?’

  ‘If that’s what you want.’

  ‘What I want right now,’ he groaned, ‘is to pick you up, and lie you down right here in front of the fire, and make love to you until you can’t think of anything or anyone but me. Twice now I’ve thought I’ve lost you, Heather,’ he told her huskily. ‘There isn’t going to be a third time. I’m never going to let you go, so don’t ask me to. So tell me now if you don’t want me.’

  Wrapping her arms around him, and pressing her mouth against his, her body moulding itself to his in an eager caress, she teased against his lips, ‘I don’t want you.’

  But he couldn’t have heard her, because he was already picking her up, and she could feel her blood heating in excited anticipation of the pleasure to come. The tablets, still scattered on the floor, were forgotten. The firelight warmed the pale silkiness of her skin and darkened the tanned hardness of Kyle’s body. He made love to her with urgency and compulsion, drowning them both in a tidal wave of ecstasy. She slept in his arms and woke to find herself alone. He had tucked his robe around her and propped up beside her a large white envelope with her name on it.

  She was just reading the contents when he walked in, wearing another robe and carrying a bottle of champagne and two glasses.

  ‘Your Christmas present,’ he told her, getting down beside her as she stared at the two plane tickets inside the Christmas card.

  ‘Did you really think I wouldn’t know how much you’d want to spend this Christmas with your parents? I was going to give it to you in the morning. A special Christmas morning surprise, but this way I don’t have to wait until tomorrow to see the pleasure in your eyes.’ He poured two glasses of champagne and handed her one.

  ‘To us and the future,’ he toasted, and as Heather sipped the dancing bubbles happiness fizzed up inside her.

  ‘Make love to me again, Kyle,’ she whispered, leaning towards him. ‘Make love to me so that I can believe all this is real.’

  * * *

  Later, when their son asked why he was called Noel when he was born in September, she would smile at Kyle and he would smile back at her, both of them knowing that the other was remembering the Christmas Eve they had consummated their love and, or so Heather suspected, she had conceived their first child.

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  Now, read on for a tantalizing excerpt of Tara Pammi’s new release,

  BOUGHT WITH THE ITALIAN’S RING

  The instalment in the Conveniently Wed! miniseries!

  Pia Vito is heir to CEO Raphael Mastrantino’s billion-dollar empire—so he initiates a calculated seduction! But when inescapable longing engulfs them both, to make her his Raphael must give her more than a diamond ring!

  Keep reading to get a glimpse of

  BOUGHT WITH THE ITALIAN’S RING

  CHAPTER ONE

  HER SKIN PRICKLED. Her body, even though overheated from two hours of dancing, suddenly tingled.

  Pia Vito could almost pinpoint the moment the piercing awareness claimed her, the moment a sudden chill replaced the warm breeze coming in through the wide doors of the vast ballroom on her grandfather’s estate.

  It was the moment he walked in.

  Raphael Mastrantino.

  Her grandfather Giovanni’s godson and protégé.

  CEO of Vito Automobiles.

  The man Milanese society seems to be in awe of.

  The women around her went into a quiet frenzy, sending longing looks his way, detailing his finer points to each other.

  From the moment she had discovered her long-lost grandfather Gio, and he had accepted her as his granddaughter at the beginning of the summer, all Pia had heard from him was stories about Raphael Mastrantino.

  And her drama-prone grandfather hadn’t exaggerated for once.

  No other man could have prowled inside the ballroom with such arrogant confidence, as if he owned the estate and all the people in it.

  No other man would look that striking in a plain white shirt while making the rest of the tuxedo-clad men look overdressed.

  No other man could have commanded the attention of an entire ballroom by his mere presence.

  Piercing eyes met hers across the ballroom, held hers, as if determined to see through to her soul.

  It was as if an electric arc had built up between them—the very concept she’d been explaining to her fifth grade students back home.

  No adjective she knew could describe the sheer masculinity of him. Broad shoulders tapered to a lean waist, long legs. The ruthless planes of his face, the stark angles were those one only saw in sculptures.

  It took every ounce of energy she possessed to keep her smile in place.

  Not even a facsimile of a greeting appeared in his hard face. With his cynical and appraising expression, even from a distance Pia felt his derision to the tips of her toes.

  Any warmth she’d felt amidst the dancing crowd dissipated as realization struck.

  Her grandfather’s godson didn’t approve of her? Why?

  Which was why she had felt his gaze on her back like a concentrated laser beam.

  Ignoring his presence—which was like the earth trying to ignore the sun—her movements awkward and stilted, she adjusted her path exiting the dance floor and kept moving, head down.

  She ran straight into something so solidly male her breath jumped into her throat. Cursing herself, she looked up. And was caught in the darkest eyes she had ever seen, draped by the lushest lashes no mascara could ever reproduce.

  When had he moved so close?

  His fingers had landed on the patch of bare skin that her dress and gloves left on her arms. The pads of his fingers pressed into her flesh, not quite hard but not gently either. As if he knew of her intention to escape him.

  The scent of him, warmed by his skin, drifted up toward her nostrils and she breathed in deeply. A furious flush began to work its way from her chest to her neck and upward at his continued scrutiny.

  She had never been comfortable with men, had no idea of that subtle, sophisticated flirting language all her fellow teachers, at least the young ones, seemed to know. Even with Frank, it had taken her two months to put a sentence together.

  But this felt as if she were naked, as if her worst fears—her loneliness after her grandmother’s death, her overwhelming need to belong somewhere, anywhere—as if it were all on display for his eyes.

  “You are not running away from me, are you, cara mia?” came a taunt in the deep, silky voice that let loose butterflies in her stomach.

  When she’d banged into him, she had braced herself with her hands and there they rested now. On him. His abdomen, to be precise. He was a granite wall under her hands. She fluttered her fingers over him, curious to see if there would be softness, if she could find more give…

  The pressure of his fingers increased over her wrists, arresting her explorations. “Do you not speak then?” This time, he sounded coldly angry. “You communicate instead by touching men?”

  Pia pulled back as if burned.

  This was ridiculous. She managed twenty eleven-year-olds every day in the classroom! How dare he give voice to something so embarrassing, something she’d only done as a reaction to stress?

  “My head hurts,” she somehow managed to say and it was partly true. “I’m not used to so much jewelry. The designer heels I’m wearing are killing my feet. Please excuse me.”

  “How charmingly you lie, Ms. Vito.”

  He delivered the insult in such a smooth voice that it took her a few seconds to realize it.

  “Next, you will tell me you hate these kinds of parties and you were just putting on a good show for Gio’s sake. That the jewelry and dress and shoes—the ones that incidentally proclaim you as a walking fortune—are not really your thing.” He twisted the last two words into a mocking American twang. “That you didn’t really enjoy dancing with every man who asked you with that innocent invitation in your eyes. That this whole evening is an elaborate charade you’re suffering through like a good sacrificial lamb.”

  That was exactly what she had been doing.

  The dress, the shoes, the jewelry, even the complicated updo her hair was twisted into, none of it was her. But she had kept quiet.

  Because she’d wanted Giovanni to be proud of her.

  Because she’d wanted to be someone else, even for one night. Sophisticated and charming and polished—not a woman who fell for lies and found herself in crushing debt.

  Yet this arrogant man made it sound as if the idea of Pia not wanting the attention, not liking being on display were impossible.

  “You’ve already drawn your conclusions, Mr. Mastrantino.”

  “How do you know who I am?”

  “Gio told me you’d be the most handsome, the most powerful and the most arrogant man I’ve ever met. He was right.” Heat climbed up her chest as he raised a brow.

  She looked around the ballroom and every pair of eyes was trained on them. Locating her grandfather’s silver hair, she sent him a please-rescue-me look.

  As if he hadn’t even seen her, Gio carried on his conversation.

  A pulse of panic drummed through her. It was as if Mr. Mastrantino, Gio and even the guests were playing a game, but no one had told Pia the rules.

  “Then you have the advantage, for he told me nothing about you. Until I saw the invitation, I didn’t even know you existed. A ball in honor of Pia Alessandra Vito.” He was a few inches taller than even her uncommon height and for the first time in her life, Pia felt dainty, even fragile. “Giovanni’s long-lost granddaughter, finally returned to the bosom of her loving family, his legacy displayed like a crowning jewel to society.”

  Why was he so ticked off with her?

  But his possessive touch stilled everything within her. Her breath hitched, and her insides seemed intent upon some kind of rearrangement. Like molecules under heat.

  “The Cinderella story of the year,” he continued, a hardness in the curve of his sensual mouth. “I assume Gio has already also bought a prince for you to dance with before the stroke of midnight too, si?”

  Bought a prince for her?

  As if a man had to be paid to be with her! Pia could feel the color leaching from her face.

  Raphael had no idea how deep his thoughtless comment dug into her.
How much it hurt.

  “Gio knows I don’t want a…” The words stilled as she tallied all the men that had been hounding her tonight.

  Why had Gio invited so many young, eligible men? Why had each and every one of them made a beeline for her? True, she was the guest of honor, but still. There were other women at the ball.

  A shiver curled around her spine.

  “Non?” Raphael inflected it enough to tell her he didn’t believe her. “Why do you think all these men have been falling over themselves to dance with you? Your great beauty?” His gaze raked her, and then dismissed her. “Your charming conversation? Your magnetic presence?”

  With each derogatory question out of his mouth, Pia knew he had it right. But she was damned if she would stand there another moment and let him mock her.

  She turned and stumbled. A pained gasp fell from her mouth.

  Strong arms wound around her waist from behind before her bottom kissed the black-and-white marble floor. His muscular forearms brushed the undersides of her breasts, pushing them up. A burst of heat filled her lower belly.

  Pia clung to him, her breath in disarray. It was too much sensation, too raw.

  Slowly, gently, as if she were a newborn calf, he turned her around. In a movement that was as fluid as it was economic, he knelt in front of her.

  Her heart pounded.

  A pin could have dropped in the ballroom and it would have been an explosion.

  His trousers stretched tight over his thighs, his austere face raised to her, he cradled her foot in a tender clasp. A lock of his thick black hair fell forward on his forehead. Those dark eyes moved over her face, down her throat, where her pulse pounded violently, to the sight of the upper curves of her meager breasts plumped into fullness by the bodice.

  A tightness emerged in his face.

  Tilting his head down, he placed her right foot on his left thigh. The tips of her fingers rested on his shoulders and she felt the muscles there shift and clench.

  With uncharacteristic malice, she hoped the pointed heel would bruise his rock-hard flesh.