“So why the hell didn’t you tell me?” Marcus demanded in a low growl.
Chris hesitated. Maybe her evidence was slim, but it seemed sound to her. Gina and Mario had been fighting on the boat. According to Sophia, they’d always had marital problems. Crimes of passion were well-known throughout Italian history. And Gina had a key to the galleries, which Marcus had lied about. Why, if not to protect his mother?
There seemed to be only one thing to do: accuse Gina before Marcus and see what his reaction was.
“Because it’s obvious,” she murmured. “You think your mother killed your father. That’s why you staged this—Marcus, no!” Chris screamed.
She had wanted a reaction. Had she drawn too much of one?
He had turned around in fury, the cleaver in his hand. Suddenly all she could see was the knife that had flashed in the galleries on the night Alfred Contini had died, and she panicked.
She instinctively jerked around, pulling the spinach pan with her. It flew up in the air, catching Marcus’s temple. Not all that hard, but hard enough for him to know he’d been hit! And, of course, just as the pan grazed him, she realized that he hadn’t been about to stab her. All he had been doing was holding the cleaver.
“Marcus, I didn’t mean to…” Her voice trailed away.
But it was too late. He was staring at her with anger, as if he certainly didn’t believe her.
“I am going to strangle you,” he muttered, a little bewildered. And then she saw his lips compress until they were nothing but a grim line and he took a step toward her, reaching for her.
“Oh, no!” Chris said, gasping, and tried to barge past him. She felt his hand grasping for her arm. He missed, but his fingers caught the terry-cloth robe. She tried to keep running. The robe stayed in his hand, and her impetus sent her crashing to the floor half naked, the rest of her tangled in the robe.
“No!” she shrieked again as he straddled her, grabbing her wrists and pulling them over her head to keep her from wildly pummeling him. Chris closed her eyes and started babbling desperately. “Please, Marcus, I didn’t mean to! I don’t care what happened in the past. I don’t care if you were blackmailing Alfred. I don’t care what you’re guilty of. I don’t care who’s guilty of anything. I don’t care about any of it. I don’t—”
She broke off. He hadn’t moved; he hadn’t said a word. She opened her eyes to see that he was staring at her with a curious light in his eyes and a bemused smile on his lips. She moistened her lips, then realized that she really was naked. His thighs were around her bare hips; her breasts were completely uncovered and heaving as she gasped for breath. The pressure he used on her wrists wasn’t painful, nor did he seem furious anymore. He was a little amused, but not completely; there was an indigo glitter in his eyes, yet his features were very, very taut. “Chris, I didn’t blackmail Alfred. Why would I?”
She hesitated. “Because he was sheltering the real murderer?” she whispered.
He laughed. “First you accuse my mother. But if I’m protecting my mother, why would I blackmail Alfred for doing the exact same thing?”
“I don’t know,” Chris murmured miserably. “I’m sorry….”
“Nor, Chris,” he said quietly, “did I murder anyone. I’m not guilty of anything…except coercing you.” He fell silent for a second, then took a long breath. “But, Chris, I do know that Alfred was being blackmailed.”
“You do?” she whispered uneasily.
“Yes.” He paused. “Large sums were going out of the company account for years. I never realized it before, because all of us were free to use that account when we needed it.”
“You knew…” was all that Chris could think to whisper.
“I suspected, and then I knew.”
She felt her flesh burn because his eyes were raking over her, and she felt as if they touched her with a slow unquenchable blaze.
“Did you really think I meant to attack you with a cleaver?” he demanded huskily.
“I—I panicked….”
“Perhaps,” he murmured, smiling, “you should panic.” He released her wrists and shifted his weight from hers, but she was still pinned to the floor. His hand coursed lightly down her arm where it was still caught in terry cloth, and then his palm was against her bare flesh, cradling her breast, teasing the nipple to a peak with slow sensual circles. She felt herself redden, and she closed her eyes with a shudder, willing her body not to arch to his touch. Yet her body ignored her will. His fingers moved over her ribs, caressed her hip, trailed down the little angle between her belly and her hip, and moved erotically over her inner thigh.
“I want you now, Chris,” he murmured to her, a fever that defied denial in the husky timbre of his voice. She opened her eyes to see his above hers, probing, demanding. And then she closed her eyes again with a little sigh that caught in her throat as he kissed her, slowly, sensually, then commandingly. Chris rolled against him, glad of the hand that continued to sweetly torment her body, to touch her like a fire that promised to build and build and build….
His lips moved to the pulse at her throat, and then his dark head dipped low. He cupped one of her breasts in his hand and savored it with his mouth, taking the nipple between his teeth and raking it again and again with his tongue. Chris cried out softly, stunned by the shattering depth of the sensation. Yet while his mouth continued to lavish attention on her breast, his hand moved again, following the curve of her hip and moving along her thigh. His knee remained between hers, giving him the freedom to taunt and explore her flesh, and bring a rush of pleasure rippling through her as he sought her most intimate places with bold audacity.
Christina unknowingly raked her nails across his back, gasping out his name. He buried his head in the shadowed valley between her breasts, then brought his lips to hers once again. Finally his eyes met hers and she saw the question in them. Didn’t he know he was assured of an answer? She couldn’t give him one, not in words. She wrapped her arms around him, pressing her face against his shoulder, almost afraid of the depth of her need for him. “The…oil…is burning,” she murmured.
“So am I,” he chuckled hoarsely, but he unwound her arms from around his neck and rose. Chris closed her eyes. She heard his footsteps and the sound of a click as he turned off the stove. Then she felt his arms around her as he drew her to her feet, smiling at her as he lifted her. “I’ll be damned if I’ll take you for the first time on the floor when there’s a wonderful bed upstairs,” he told her.
She closed her eyes again, loving the feel of his body, the ripple of muscles, as he carried her up the stairs. He knew the way; he didn’t turn on a light. There was a waning moon outside, and it cast enough of a glow so that they could see one another.
He didn’t set her on the bed, though, but placed her on her feet, slipping his hands beneath the robe that still clung precariously to her shoulders so that it fell away from her, like an unveiling. She felt his eyes, hungry as they moved over her, and again she burned and shivered at the simple delight of his gaze. She wanted to touch him, but she didn’t seem to be able to move. She stood with her eyes locked with his as he unbuttoned his cuffs and then the front of his shirt. He slipped off his shoes, kicking them aside, then tugged at his belt buckle. With the lithe movements she had come to expect from him, he shed his pants and briefs. Chris closed her eyes, shaking with her desire for him as he stepped forward and took her in his arms again. His body was flush against hers: hard thighs, muscled chest, throbbing arousal. And still he kissed her lingeringly, backing her toward the bed until she fell against it, welcoming him with a fever as he followed her down.
Now she was able to touch him. Her hands moved in a frenzy, stroking his face, kneading his shoulders, trailing down the long line of his back, her nails scraping over his buttocks, her fingers fascinated at his tight muscles. He whispered husky encouragement to her, Italian words that made no sense, yet made all the sense in the world. He nipped at her earlobe and at her neck, and again he moved to t
aste her flesh, her breasts and her belly, and all the while his hands soothed and ignited her, roaming where they would, eliciting sharp cries from her.
She was amazed and stunned and almost frighteningly aroused by his touch. He made love to her with no hesitation, giving no quarter, and she quickly lost control of all thought, consumed by the wonder of sensation, completely pliant to his will. She felt his fingers beneath her bottom, lifting her, and she felt a new burning between her thighs, deep and sensual, moist, as his intimate probing stroked her to a total frenzy where she heedlessly cried out his name, her head tossing, her hips arching with an urgency all their own. She begged him, and she didn’t know what she was begging for. All she knew was that she wanted him, all of him, so badly that she was almost in tears.
He moved beside her, clutching her hand, bringing it to him. She swallowed, clutching him, caressing him, moaning softly, barely aware and yet thrilled that she had created the throbbing ardency of his passion, a little frightened and awed again at the ferocity of her feelings, at the absolute fever that controlled her. And yet his whisper was with her, the beautiful, encouraging cadence of his words.
He moved over her, spreading her thighs with the powerful force of his knees and his body. She saw his eyes, indigo in the night, laced with desire, and she clutched his shoulders before he could lower himself.
“Marcus…I…”
“Cara?” he whispered.
“I don’t…know what I’m doing.”
“Christina,” he murmured, “you certainly do.”
“No, I…”
He seemed to start. “The first time?” he queried with a ragged breath.
“I’ve spent a lot of time in school,” she whispered lamely. “I’ve been involved…but never this involved.”
The sound of his soft chuckle enveloped her all over again with warmth; he touched her face with a tenderness all the more gratifying because she could feel the leashed ferocity of his passion. He kissed her, and as his lips savored her, he thrust carefully, slowly into her, holding her body tightly to his own, absorbing the initial shock and immediately soothing her from it. There was pain, like the flash of a knife, but his strokes were slow and deep, and she was arching to receive them while her body still shuddered with both the shock and the growing wonder. The blaze began to build again, soaring like an indigo fire, and she gave herself up to its flames, kissing him, pressing against him, biting him lightly on his shoulders, grazing her hands again and again over his back, drawing delighted words from him when her fingers curved over his buttocks, inviting the total unleashing of his passion.
She had known since she had first seen him that he had promised this abandoned wonder, this absolute flaring passion. And now, as she writhed and cried and moaned, craving something ultimate, she knew the true extent of his promise. He lifted himself, thrusting deep…deep…deep…and it burst upon her, like shimmering light, totally shocking and magnificent, and she shuddered again and again in the aftermath, stunned by the shattering delight of complete sexual sensation.
For a long while she lay without moving, loath to allow the satisfied and drifting sensation to fade. A summer breeze swept through the windows, cooling them. Chris could feel his flesh, damp beside hers; in the pale light she could see his arm stretched across her midriff. She had never felt so close to a person before in her life; she had never been so content, and yet even as she tried hard to hold on tight to all that had been so wonderful, something within her began to withdraw. She’d always believed instinctively that she could trust him; now she believed so more than ever. But he was a di Medici; if he talked to her, he would still conceal his real feelings and his real thoughts. He had gone through quite a charade to keep her safe, and yet she still wasn’t certain whether it had been done to protect her—or his family.
Lying in bed, feeling him, touching him, she realized very clearly that they were at opposite ends of the spectrum. She was a Tarleton. No charade could really turn her into a di Medici, not when James Tarleton was still considered to have been a murderer. And not when she had become a di Medici by dark and secretive means. She shivered suddenly, remembering Sophia’s warnings about her future happiness…or lack thereof.
Well, it didn’t really matter, Chris thought dismally. Sophia didn’t know that Marcus had taken drastic measures merely because he didn’t want another corpse on his hands.
He must have been thinking, too. He traced a finger idly between her breasts to her navel. Chris swallowed, not willing to deny him, but aware that she had to withdraw to salvage her emotions. She was glad that the room was dark.
Marcus sighed, as if sensing that he had lost her. He made no comment on their being together; he swung his feet over the side of the bed and found his pants. “Let’s go downstairs and get something to eat,” he said, and the suggestion sounded like an order. “And get everything straightened out that’s happened from the very beginning.” He picked up her robe and brought it to the bed, bending with a little smile on his lips before he kissed her briefly. “Belt it tightly, please. You’re not going to get away with distracting me this time.”
“Me!” Chris protested. She was glad of the robe, though, and quickly slipped back into it.
“Umm,” he murmured, walking barefoot and bare chested to the door. He paused, looking back at her. Chris tied the robe, flushing beneath his scrutiny, even in the dim light.
“What?” she demanded at last, unnerved.
He shook his head. “You’re a bit of an anachronism these days. For an American, that is.”
“Oh?”
She saw the flash of his teeth in the moonlight. “Isn’t it unusual for an American woman to actually come to her husband’s bed untouched?”
Chris felt new color flood her features; he sounded mocking. She forced herself to walk smoothly across the room and past him on the way to the small hall and staircase. “I don’t remember saying that I was actually ‘untouched,’” she murmured coolly. “Nor, for that matter, are we really married.”
He laughed, but she sensed no humor in the dry sound. “Oh, it was quite real. Trust me.”
“But not intentional,” Chris retorted, her face averted from his as she preceded him down the stairs. “It’s another problem that’s going to have to be worked out. Something you got us into and you’re going to have to get us out of.”
“Let’s take things as they come, shall we?” he said impatiently, moving her out of his way so he could step into the kitchen and light the burner beneath the frying pan again.
She didn’t respond, but just stared at him, wondering how they could be so close—and yet so distant.
He picked up the cleaver and started on the chicken again. When she still didn’t move, he looked up at her impatiently.
“Mi scusi, darling, but for the moment you are my wife, Christina di Medici, and though I like to think we Italians have come a long way, it’s not customary for the husband to be doing all the cooking. Especially after his wife just struck him with the spinach pan. Even if she did make amends rather nicely. Want to help?” The last was rather pointed. Annoyed, flushing again, Chris lowered her head and moved into the kitchen.
Fifteen minutes ago she had forgotten that anything in the world except the power of his pulsing body and her own. Yet he could talk to her as if he had barely as much as kissed her.
But he did intend to get to the bottom of things. To talk, to thrash it out. Wasn’t that exactly what she wanted?
Yes, but…
She had wanted more. Some wild proclamation of love and devotion. Sweet words of adoration. A humble admission that, yes, he had tricked her into marriage, not only to protect her but because he had loved and needed her….
Chris sighed and bent to pick up the spinach pan, thinking a little guiltily that she should ask him if he was okay. But then his hand smacked her derriere and she straightened instead to give him a nasty glance of outrage.
He laughed. “Come on. Let’s get this show on the r
oad. I’m starving. And,” he added softly, pausing for a second to draw her body against his and span his hands around her waist as he whispered against her earlobe, “I’d very much like to get business out of the way for the evening. This opportunity is just too wonderful to waste.”
For a minute Chris felt like hitting him over the head with the pan again, but she held dead still, closing her eyes and fighting for serenity instead.
She had no intention of denying her fascination for him or his desire for her.
Only of denying her love.
CHAPTER 10
They ate at the kitchen counter, across from one another. Chris was glad, because as he listened to her, she had the feeling that he still doubted something about her, and the sensation was very irritating.
“So,” he said, watching her as he sipped his wine, “you came to Venice only because the mime troupe came to Venice. You’d never called, written or sent a Christmas card because your family had shied away from the past. But you met Alfred and came right home with him.”
Chris set down her fork, pushed her plate away and folded her arms on the counter with exasperation. “I knew a little about Alfred Contini, the di Medicis and the galleries. I was curious. Wouldn’t you have been?”
He shrugged. “And right after you came to the palazzo, Alfred started hinting that he knew your father hadn’t killed mine.”
“Yes.”
“He told you to meet him at the galleries. You went. You saw this figure in a cloak arguing with him. Then the figure pulls out a knife. Alfred starts running…and has his fatal heart attack.”
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t bother to tell anyone about this cloaked figure at the time.”
“I tried to talk to you!” Chris flared. “You didn’t want to listen!”
He ignored her. “Anyway, in the gem salon, you saw what you thought to be a blackmail note. So you went through extravagant preparations and broke into the galleries.”
The Di Medici Bride Page 20