by Lynne Graham
With a roughened groan of raw impatience, Rafaello meshed one hand into the soft coils of her honey-blonde hair to hold her still and he brought his mouth crashing down with hungry intensity on hers. For a split-second, she went rigid with shock and he took advantage. He backed her up against the cool metallic wall and splayed his hands beneath her hips to lift her up to him. And then he let his tongue drive between her parted lips with erotic force, plundering the tender interior within, and every nerve-ending in her quivering body went haywire.
She wrapped her arms round his neck and clung, kissing him back with mindless fervour. A tormented moan of response was dragged from low in her throat. She couldn’t get enough of that drugging passion which she had once worked so hard to forget. The very strength and power of the hard male physique keeping her pinned back to the wall inflamed her with dangerous heat. Helpless in the grip of her own increasing excitement, she was beyond thought or objection when he splayed her thighs round him, the better to anchor her to him.
And then, without any warning whatsoever, Rafaello froze. With a ragged groan, he released her swollen mouth and gazed down at her with heavily lidded smouldering golden eyes that had a faintly dazed light. ‘Per meraviglia… We are in a lift in a public building!’
In an equally sudden movement, Rafaello settled her back down onto her own feet. In shock, Glory finally realised that the lift was still and that all the lights on the control panel were flashing but that the doors had yet to open. ‘Why isn’t it moving?’
‘I stopped it,’ Rafaello admitted curtly, stabbing a couple of buttons.
With a slight lurch the lift set off downward again, while Glory smoothed shaking hands down her rucked sweater. She could not bring herself to look at him. It was one of those moments when intense mortification and essential honesty combined to prevent her from coming up with a single face-saving excuse. Her lips burning from the heat of his, her trembling body still struggling to come down from the heights of anticipation he had contrived to fire within seconds of touching her, she felt shattered.
‘We’ll go back to my apartment,’ Rafaello breathed thickly.
Sensing that lunch would not be Rafaello’s most pressing goal, Glory reddened to the roots of her hair with shame. ‘Nothing doing. I’m going home. I told you that. This was an accident—’
‘An…accident?’ Rafaello repeated in thunderous disbelief.
‘Like when you take your eyes off the road and crash!’ Glory stressed shakily, almost being eaten alive by the strength of her own self-loathing.
The lift doors swept back with an electronic beep of warning, exposing them to all onlookers. There was a crush of bodies waiting outside but their impatient surge forward was arrested by the sight of the male within. A sea of wildly curious faces stared in at Rafaello and Glory.
Glory lurched into frantic motion. She pushed her way through the stilled crowd and then raced across the busy ground-floor foyer for the exit doors. She ran a good half of the way back to the train station and then, winded and barely able to catch her breath, was forced to halt her mad flight and walk instead.
However, the sense of panic and severe embarrassment induced by what she had allowed to happen between herself and Rafaello was in no way lessened. How could she have behaved like that? One minute telling him she had only come back to give him a piece of her mind, the next winding herself round him like the weakest of choking vines. Talk about handing out conflicting signals!
CHAPTER THREE
THE following day Glory had an early shift at the factory and then finished work early, as was the norm on a Friday afternoon.
Feeling exhausted, she trudged up the stairs to her top-floor bedsit. She had her key in the door before she actually noticed the slip of paper stuck to the scarred wood. ‘Urgent,’ ran the message in the girl next door’s handwriting. ‘Phone your dad!’
Her heart in her mouth at the thought of what those four words might mean, Glory clattered back down the stairs again to use the coinbox phone in the hall.
Her father answered her call almost immediately. ‘Is that you, Glory?’
‘What is it? What’s happened?’ she prompted breathlessly.
‘The police arrived first thing this morning with a search warrant.’
‘A s-search warrant?’ Glory stammered in horror.
‘They found that stolen snuff box hidden in our fuel shed,’ Archie Little told her heavily. ‘Sam was arrested. The police have charged him, but he didn’t do it. I know he didn’t do it!’
As Glory absorbed what her father was telling her, shock chilled her skin to the temperature of ice. ‘Sam was arrested…and charged?’
‘His best mate is the one who did the stealing,’ he asserted bitterly. ‘When Sam came to me for help during that party Joe was with him, but he insisted on staying outside. When I left the cottage to go up and turf their mates out of the Park I saw Joe coming out of the shed—’
‘Oh, Dad…’ Glory mumbled sickly, her heart sinking like a stone.
‘I wondered what the kid had been doing but I was too keen to get that party stopped to waste time asking him. But Joe must’ve panicked and hidden the box then. But who’s going to believe that when it was found in our shed?’ Archie Little demanded on the rising note of a man already taxed beyond his endurance level. ‘What are we going to do, Glory? I don’t know what to do or where to turn now—’
‘I’ll sort something out,’ Glory heard herself insist with forced confidence. ‘Tell Sam I’m thinking of him and that I believe in him—’
‘How are you going to sort out anything? It’s too late,’ her father groaned, and she could hear the thickness of tears and the defeat in his response. ‘The solicitor says we just have to wait until it comes to court.’
‘Trust me…I’ll arrange something, I swear I will. Don’t let Sam get too upset about this,’ Glory warned, because her kid brother was an emotional boy and now she was worried sick. Suppose he ran away or, even worse, became even more depressed and did something foolish? She shivered. Her father was not the rock that a scared teenager needed for support, nor the best person to persuade Sam that they could fight to prove his innocence.
Only when Glory came off the phone did she discover that she was shaking like a leaf. Momentarily she closed her eyes in anguish. She could have saved Sam from the ordeal of being arrested and charged. But now that the forces of law and order had got involved, was it even possible that the theft charge could be dropped? And even if it was possible, would Rafaello now be willing to do it?
She lifted out her purse and searched for the phone number she had used forty-eight hours earlier to contact Rafaello’s London office and ask for her appointment. She got passed through to his secretary, but there the trail as such threatened to go cold. Rafaello was not available, she was told starchily.
‘Has he gone abroad?’ Glory pressed fearfully. ‘Look, this is very urgent. I really need to know where he is.’
‘Mr Grazzini is at his country house and I’m afraid I’m not able to give you either the address or the phone number. However, I will pass on your message—’
‘No, please don’t do that!’ Glory interrupted in dismay, thinking that forewarning of her change of heart might only harden his. In another mood she might have smiled at the secretary’s mistake in mentioning Rafaello’s whereabouts. Naturally the woman had no idea that Glory would know exactly where that country house was situated.
An element of surprise might be the only thing she had going for her, Glory reflected in desperation as she yanked out her travel bag. She would catch the train down to Montague Park and try to see Rafaello before she went to see her family. What else could she do? Leave Sam facing theft charges? But would Rafaello even listen to her now?
After her senseless behaviour the afternoon before Glory knew that Rafaello would be furious with her. Her second visit to his office and her wild response to that steamy embrace, followed by her equally sudden flight, had been madness.
Even with the best will in the world, she knew she could never explain why she had gone back while still maintaining that she had no intention of accepting his offer. If she couldn’t explain that to herself, how could she possibly hope to explain it to him?
Zipping up her bag, she looked at herself in the mirror and almost had a heart attack! Her hair was falling down in messy strands from an unglamorous pony-tail. Her pale, anxious face was bare of make-up and her jeans and shirt were hardly of the ilk calculated to persuade a man that she was worth sacrificing a principle for. And, where principles were concerned, Rafaello could make a person feel distinctly uncomfortable. He had said the offer would be closed if she did not take it up in the time frame he had set. So if she was to persuade him otherwise she would have to look good, look seductive…?
Not a challenge Glory had ever taken on before, when her greatest need had always been to find one special man who would see her as a person rather than a sexual challenge and a trophy. Already painfully aware that her full-lipped face, blonde hair and hourglass shape encouraged men to assume that she would be an easy lay, Glory never wore provocative clothes. But provocative was the look required, wasn’t it? Reminding herself of her kid brother’s current plight, she left her bedsit to knock on her neighbour’s door.
Tania, a small, bubbly brunette, currently working nights in a busy city bar, opened her door. ‘Glory…did you get my message?’
‘Yes, thanks. Look, I was wondering, would you let me borrow one of your clubbing outfits?’ Glory asked hesitantly.
Tania surveyed her with an exaggerated dropped jaw.
‘I’d be really careful with it,’ Glory promised in a humble tone.
‘Are you the woman who told me you wouldn’t be seen dead flashing your legs in a short skirt just to give some sick bloke a cheap thrill?’
Glory reddened and nodded slowly.
‘Are you the same woman who told me boobs were made to be covered, not put out like cut-price fruit on a stall?’
Glory winced at that second reminder and nodded again in guilty confirmation.
Tania gave her cringing visitor a hugely amused grin and let Glory in. ‘So tell me…who’s the guy you’re hanging up your combat trousers and workman’s boots for?’
Glory paled and thought. ‘A challenge?’
‘I love a challenge!’ Tania threw wide the door of her crammed wardrobe. ‘Trust me, Glory. Now that you’ve owned up to your desperation, I’ll be your best pal.’
Three-quarters of an hour later Glory studied her transformed appearance in her own room. A frilly pink top hugged her lush bosom, and she had had to squeeze into the stretchy short pink skirt with its racy split. Her stiletto-heeled shoes had only two tiny narrow satin bands studded with diamanté to hold in her feet. Above one ankle she now sported a fashionable henna transfer tattoo in an oriental design. Tattoos drive men wild Tania had assured her. Glory had wondered out loud whether some males might prefer greater subtlety. But Tania it had to be admitted, had far more experience, and had said that at heart men were one and all the same: they were just slaves to their hormones every time.
‘You’re gonna stop the traffic. Next time we go out together, you put on your combat trousers and boots again.’ Tania warned her, smoothing the shining mane of honey-blonde hair which hung halfway down Glory’s narrow back. ‘I couldn’t stick this amount of competition. I’d be so jealous, I’d never speak to you again.’
‘No problem. I don’t like looking like this…not that I’m not grateful,’ Glory added hurriedly as she pulled on her raincoat.
‘I hope he’s worth the effort—’
‘He probably thinks he is.’ Glory set off for the bus that would take her to the train.
Shortly after seven that evening, Glory finally reached the imposing gates of Montague Park and contemplated the mile-long driveway that stretched before her.
Chafed by the diamanté straps, her feet were already in agony. And, in truth, she did not actually want to arrive at her destination. Or that ghastly moment when she would have to tell Rafaello that he had won and that she would be his for as long as he wanted it that way. While she cringed for herself and grovelled, she would also have the added torment of knowing that he was enjoying every minute of her major climbdown.
Twenty minutes later she reached the grand front doors of the superb Georgian mansion and hit the bell.
The housekeeper, Maud Belper, gazed out at her in astonished recognition. ‘Glory?’
‘I’d be really grateful if you wouldn’t mention to my dad that you saw me here,’ Glory whispered guiltily, sidling in past the older woman, who had known her since childhood. ‘Is Mr Grazzini home?’
‘Would that be Mr Benito or Mr Rafaello?’ Maud enquired, deciding that two could play the mystery game of mutual ignorance.
‘Rafaello,’ Glory mumbled, her colour heightening.
‘Let me take your coat—’
Glory clutched her coat to her. ‘No…no, thanks. I’ve got a cold coming on and I’m feeling the chill.’
‘Mr Grazzini’s in the library.’
Glory nodded and listened to the housekeeper’s steps retreat at a tellingly slow pace.
Leaving her travel bag behind, she limped over to the library door on her poor, tortured feet and undid the belt on her raincoat. She felt like a flasher. Suppose Rafaello laughed? Suppose she did genuinely look as trashy and silly as she feared that she did? This is for Sam, she reminded herself, and on the spur of that she walked into the room, paused and discarded the coat in almost the same movement. He could only interpret her announced arrival and her vampish appearance in one way. And, if he took that hint, hopefully she wouldn’t have to grovel quite so much.
Talking on the phone over by the window, Rafaello froze as though Glory had burst in waving a hand grenade. He blinked. He looked again, kept on looking. Stunned dark golden eyes started afresh at the crown of her honey-blonde head, worked slowly down over her taut but beautiful face and back over the full pouting thrust of her breasts as delineated in skintight pink. There he seemed to pause to take a much needed break and he breathed in audibly before meeting the challenge of proceeding further in a downward direction.
Glory stood there like a martyr tied to the stake with a face hotter than any flames could have provoked. She could feel every ragged breath struggling past her convulsed throat as the tension rose. Staying still and silent was the hardest thing she had ever done. He had forced her to reduce herself to the level of a sex object desperate to sell herself to the highest bidder, and her pride was crushed.
Rafaello had trouble dragging his attention from the well-defined curve of her hips, but when he reached her legs he appeared to be even more challenged to keep his intent appraisal moving. Finally his scrutiny screamed to a halt above the slender ankle displaying the henna transfer tattoo.
Suddenly he flashed his smouldering eyes back up to her severely strained features. An aristocratic black brow was elevated. ‘What is this? A pantomime in which you star as the sex bomb?’
Glory had never been very confident that Rafaello would be a slave to his hormones as Tania had forecast, for Rafaello had a natural stubborn streak that rejoiced in never doing exactly what was expected of him. A ‘pantomime’? She shrivelled with embarrassment at his use of that particular word. His sardonic response annihilated her where she stood.
Stepping painfully off one foot onto the other, striving to spread the agony of her complaining toes, Glory stooped. In a harried movement she snatched up her coat and dived back into its concealing folds. Once again she had made a total fool of herself, she reflected in choked mortification. Scorching tears lashed the backs of her eyes so hard she had to widen them and focus on a point over his shoulder to keep them from falling.
‘No, of course I am not talking to you,’ Rafaello breathed with chilling cool to the excusably confused and unfortunate person he had been speaking to on the phone when she first entered and whose invisible listening presenc
e he had briefly forgotten. ‘I have a visitor. I’ll call you back.’
While he spoke Glory watched him. A powerful feeling of torment and tragedy was now assailing her already ragged nerves. Why had she torn off her raincoat in that utterly stupid way? She had been terrified that she would lose her nerve at the last moment. She had hoped to strike an impression of being cool, even rather amused and scornful, but fully in control of events. She had failed: he thought she looked ridiculous. But there he was, the very image of enviable cool and sophistication in a superbly tailored dark suit that was probably the ultimate in Italian style.
Rafaello cast aside the receiver. Dark, deep-set eyes hooded, he scanned Glory as she hugged her coat as if it was the only thing standing between her and total nudity. ‘I’m waiting for an explanation.’
‘What do you want me to say?’ Glory asked jaggedly, her throat closing over, her wide, over-bright eyes staring a hole into the middle distance. She had looked enough at him. That bold masculine face in profile, the shadow his lush black lashes cast on one high cheekbone, the arrogant nose, the wide, sexy mouth. Even half a view of him made her heart race and set butterflies dancing in her tummy.
‘OK…’ Rafaello drawled in the silken tone of a male taking up a challenge without hesitation. ‘Yesterday you raced back to my office and fell into my arms—’
‘I did not fall into your arms, I was grabbed—’ Glory squeezed out between gritted teeth.
Rafaello ignored that contradiction. ‘If I hadn’t called time I do believe we would’ve had sex in the lift—’
‘Speak for yourself!’ Glory launched at him in strong chagrin. ‘I don’t behave like that—’
‘Don’t you?’ Rafaello vented a derisive laugh. ‘When you burst in here I thought some maniac had decided to treat me to a strippergram!’
‘A…what?’ Glory gasped in dismay.
‘Dressed like that you look like a cheap little scrubber.’ Rafaello skimmed her a brooding scrutiny and his hard sensual mouth twisted. ‘Not my style; a definite turn-off.’