by Lynne Graham
‘All right.’ Holly subsided to scrutinise the opulent diamond engagement ring on her finger. Vito wasn’t the least bit romantic, she conceded ruefully, because he had sent the ring to her by special delivery rather than presenting her with it. That had been such a disappointment to her. It would have meant so much to Holly if Vito had made the effort to personally give her the ring.
‘Let’s simply be a normal couple from here on in,’ Vito had urged, and seemingly the ring signified that normality he wanted even if it had not entailed him changing his ways.
She had wanted to ask if it was the same ring Marzia, his previous fiancée, had worn but had sealed her lips shut in case that question was tactless. And staging a potentially difficult conversation with a male she had barely seen since she had agreed to marry him had struck her as unwise.
‘Of course I’m very busy now. How else could I take time off for the wedding?’ Vito had enquired piously on the phone when she’d tried to tactfully suggest that he make more effort to spend some time with her and Angelo.
Vito hadn’t even been able to make time for Angelo, whom he had only seen once since their agreement. Of course, to be fair, he had suggested that they move into his London apartment before the wedding and she had been ready to agree until she had heard from Pixie’s brother and had realised that there was no way she could leave her injured friend to cope alone in a house with stairs. She had had to put Pixie first but Vito had not understood that. In fact Vito had called it a silly excuse that was dividing him from his son. After the wedding she needed to explain to Vito just how much of a debt she owed Pixie for her friend’s support during her pregnancy and after Angelo’s birth, and she needed to explain that she loved Pixie as much as she would have loved a sister. Although, never having had a sibling of his own, he might not even understand that.
And there were an awful lot of things that Vito didn’t understand, Holly reflected ruefully. He had been thoroughly irritated when she’d insisted on continuing her childminding until her charges’ parents had had time to make other arrangements for their care, but Holly would not have dreamt of letting anyone down, and took her responsibilities just as seriously as he took his own.
Furthermore, in every other way Vito had contrived to take over Holly and her son’s lives. He had made decisions on their behalf that he had neglected to discuss with Holly. Maybe he thought she was too stupid and ignorant to make the right decisions, she thought unhappily.
First he had landed her with an Italian nanny, who had had to board at a hotel nearby because there were only two bedrooms in the house Pixie and Holly rented. London-born Lorenza was a darling and wonderful with Angelo, and Holly had needed outside help to cope with shopping for a wedding dress and such things, but she still would have preferred to play an active role in the hiring of a carer for her son.
Secondly, he had landed Holly with a horrible, pretentious fashion stylist who had wanted Holly to choose the biggest, splashiest and most expensive wedding gown ever made. Only sheer stubbornness had ensured that Holly actually got to wear her own choice of dress on her special day. And it was a very plain dress because Holly was convinced that she was too small and curvy to risk wearing anything more elaborate. She stroked the delicate edge of a lace sleeve with satisfaction. At least she had got her dream dress even if she hadn’t got any input into any other details because Vito had placed all the organisation into the hands of a wedding planner, whom he had instructed not to consult his future wife.
In truth, Vito was extremely bossy and almost painfully insensitive sometimes. He had left it to his social secretary to tell Holly that she had a day at a grooming parlour booked for a makeover. Holly had been mortified, wondering whether Vito thought her ordinary ungroomed self was a mess and not up to his standards. Pixie had told her not to be so prickly and had asked her if she thought there was something immoral about manicures and waxing. And no, of course she didn’t think that, it was just that she had wanted Vito to want her as she was, not be left feeling that only a very polished version of her could now be deemed acceptable. After all, she didn’t have the security of knowing her bridegroom loved her, flaws and all, and that made a big difference to a woman’s confidence, she reasoned worriedly.
‘Will you stop it? And don’t ask me what you’re to stop!’ Pixie said bluntly. ‘You’re worrying yourself sick about marrying Vito and it’s crazy. You love him—’
‘I don’t love him,’ Holly contradicted instantly. ‘I like him. I’m very attracted to him.’
‘You look him up online just to drool over his photos. If it’s not love, it’s a monster crush. So you might as well be married to him,’ Pixie contended. ‘Vito’s all you think about. In fact watching you scares the hell out of me. I don’t think I could bear to love anyone the way you love him, but with a little luck in time he may well return your feelings.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘I don’t see why not,’ Pixie responded thoughtfully. ‘Vito’s the caring type even if he hasn’t yet learned to share. Why shouldn’t he fall in love with you?’
But it wasn’t love she felt, Holly told herself urgently. It was liking, attraction, respect, nothing more, nothing less. Loving Vito without being loved back would simply make her unhappy and she refused to be unhappy. No, she was a very hands-on person and she was going to make the most of what she did have with Vito and Angelo, not make the mistake of pining for what she couldn’t have. After all, she could plainly see Vito in all his very good-looking and sophisticated glory and she knew she was only getting to marry him because some crazy fate had deposited her as a damsel in distress on his doorstep one Christmas Eve night.
Her foster mother, Sylvia, pushed Pixie down the aisle in her wheelchair while Holly walked to the altar, striving not to be intimidated by the sheer size of the church and the overwhelming number of unfamiliar faces crammed into it. Vito stood beside a guy with black shoulder-length hair and startling green eyes whom she recognised from online photographs as his best friend, Apollo Metraxis. Holly only looked at the bronzed Greek long enough to establish that he was giving her a distinctly cold appraisal before her attention switched quite naturally to Vito, who, unromantic or otherwise, was at least managing to smile that breathtaking smile of his.
Her heart bounced around in her chest to leave her breathless and when he closed his hand over hers at the altar she was conscious only of him and the officiating priest. She listened with quiet satisfaction to the words of the wedding ceremony, grinned when Angelo let out a little baby shout from his place on Lorenza’s lap in a front pew and stared down all of a glow at the wedding band Vito threaded smoothly onto her finger. It was her wedding day and she was determined to enjoy it.
When they signed the register, she was introduced to a smiling older woman clad in a lilac suit and hat with diamonds sparkling at her throat.
‘I’m Vito’s mamma, Concetta,’ the attractive brunette told her warmly. ‘I’ve met my grandson. He is beautiful.’
Unsurprisingly, Holly was charmed by such fond appreciation of her son and her anxiety about how Vito’s mother might feel about his sudden marriage dwindled accordingly. Concetta, it seemed, was willing to give her a fighting chance at acceptance. Vito’s friend Apollo, however, could barely hide his hostility towards her and she wondered at it. Didn’t he realise that this marriage was what Vito had wanted? Did he think she had somehow forced his friend into proposing? Holly’s chin came up and her big blue eyes fired with resolution because she was happy to have become Vito’s wife and Angelo’s mother and she had no intention of pretending otherwise.
After some photos taken at the church they moved on to the hotel where the reception was being held. ‘There are so many guests,’ she commented with nervous jerkiness when they climbed out of the limo, an easier exercise than it might have been because Holly’s closely fitted gown did not have a train.
‘My family has a lot of friends but some guests are business acquaintances,’ Vito admi
tted. ‘You shouldn’t be apprehensive. Invariably wedding guests are well-wishers.’
Apollo’s name was on her lips but she compressed it. She didn’t think much of the Greek for deciding he disliked her, sight unseen. What happened to giving a person a fair chance? But she refused to allow Apollo’s brooding presence to cast a shadow over her day. And although Apollo was supposed to be Vito’s best man, and Pixie the chief and only bridesmaid, Apollo snubbed Pixie as well. Of course, he had brought a partner with him, a fabulously beautiful blonde underwear model with legs that could rival a giraffe’s and little desire to melt into the background.
As was becoming popular, the speeches were staged before the meal was served. Holly’s foster mother, Sylvia, had insisted on saying a few words and they were kind, warming words that Holly very much appreciated. Concetta Zaffari had chosen not to speak and Vito’s father had not been invited to the wedding. When Apollo stood up, Holly stiffened and the most excruciating experience of her life commenced with his speech. In a very amusing way Apollo began to tell the tale of the billionaire banker trapped by the snow and the waitress who had broken down at the foot of the lane. Holly felt humiliated, knowing that everyone who had seen Angelo and worked out her son’s age was now aware that he had been conceived from a one-night stand.
Vito gripped her hand so hard it almost hurt and hissed in her ear, ‘I did not know he was planning to tell our story!’
Holly said nothing. She wasn’t capable of saying anything, meeting Pixie’s compassionate gaze across the circular table, recognising Concetta Zaffari’s compassion on her behalf in her gentle appraisal. She could feel her face getting hotter and hotter and pictured herself resembling a giant blushing tomato and it was a mercy when Apollo had concluded his maliciously polite speech, which had left her pierced by a dozen poisonous darts of condemnation. He had outed her as a slut at the very least and a gold-digger at worst because he had made it sound the most impossible coincidence that her car had gone off the road at that convenient point. But worst of all, he had not uttered a single lie.
‘What a bastard!’ Pixie said roundly when she had contrived to follow Holly into the palatial cloakroom. ‘Vito’s furious! He asked me to come and see that you were all right.’
‘I shouldn’t be ashamed of being a waitress or a woman who fell pregnant after a one-night stand,’ Holly muttered apologetically. ‘But somehow sitting there in front of all those richly dressed, bejewelled people I felt like rubbish.’
Sylvia joined them at that point and put her arms around Holly. ‘That young man’s a rather nasty piece of work,’ she opined ruefully. ‘That was a very inappropriate speech, in the circumstances. Holly…sticks and stones may break your bones but words can never hurt you.’
‘Not true.’ Holly sighed, breathing in deep. ‘But don’t worry about me. I can handle it—’
‘But you shouldn’t have to on your wedding day, as I told your bridegroom,’ Pixie framed angrily.
‘No, no, let it go,’ Holly urged ruefully. ‘I’ve got over it already. I was being oversensitive.’
Her foster mother departed and Pixie said several rather unrepeatable things about Apollo Metraxis before the two women began to make their way back to the function room. And then suddenly Pixie stopped her wheelchair and shot out a hand to yank at Holly’s wrist to urge her into the alcove in the corridor. She held a finger to her lips in the universal silencing motion and Holly frowned, wondering what on earth her friend was playing at.
And then she heard it, Apollo’s unforgettable posh British accent honed by years of public schooling. ‘No, as you know, he wouldn’t listen to me. No DNA test, no pre-nup…get this? He trusts her. No, he’s not an idiot. It’s my bet he’s playing a deeper game with this sham marriage. Maybe planning to go for full custody of his son once he has them in Italy. Vito’s no fool. He simply plays his cards close to his chest.’
Holly turned deathly pale because there was not the smallest doubt that Apollo was talking about her and Angelo and Vito. For a split second she honestly wished she hadn’t eavesdropped and she could see by her friend’s expression that Pixie was now regretting the impulse as well because of what they had overheard. But without a word she planted firm hands on the handles of the wheelchair and moved her friend out of the alcove and back towards the function room.
But Holly was shattered inside and her expressive face was wooden and, after one glance at her, Vito whirled her onto the dance floor and closed his arms round her. Rage with Apollo was still simmering inside Vito like a cauldron. Well aware of his friend’s attitude towards his marriage, Vito blamed himself for still including him in the event. He had naively assumed that, after meeting Holly, Apollo would realise how outrageous his cynical outlook was when it came to her. But his misplaced trust in the Greek billionaire had resulted in his bride’s hurt on what he very well knew she believed should be a happy day. Even worse, he was still recovering from the unprecedented surge of raw protective reaction he had experienced during that speech. Any individual who wounded Holly should be his enemy, certainly not a trusted confidant of many years’ standing.
‘I’m sorry, really sorry about Apollo’s speech,’ he told her in a driven undertone. ‘If I’d had the slightest idea what he was planning to say—’
‘You should’ve kept your mouth shut about how we met,’ Holly told him in an unforgiving tone. ‘If you hadn’t opened your big mouth, he wouldn’t have known—’
‘Holly… I didn’t know that we were going to end up together—’
‘No, that came right out of left field with Angelo, didn’t it?’ Holly agreed in a saccharine-sweet tone he had never heard from her before. ‘Just boy talk, was it? The brunette slapper I pulled at Christmas?’
Dark colour rimming his high cheekbones, Vito gazed down at her with dark eyes blazing like golden flames. ‘Are you seriously saying that you didn’t tell Pixie about us?’
Hoist by her own petard, Holly reddened and compressed her lips.
‘Thought so,’ Vito said with satisfaction and she wanted to slap him very hard indeed. ‘We both spoke out of turn but you have the kinder and wiser friend.’
‘Yes,’ Holly conceded gruffly, tears suddenly shining in her eyes.
‘I have spoken to Apollo. If it’s any consolation I wanted to punch him for the first time in our long friendship. He’s a hothead with a very low opinion of marriage in general. His father married six times,’ Vito explained ruefully. ‘I know that doesn’t take away the sting but, speaking for myself, I don’t care how many people know how I met my very lovely, very sexy wife and acquired an even cuter baby. You’re a Zaffari now. A Zaffari always holds his or her head high.’
‘Is that so?’ Holly’s heavy heart was steadily lightening because it meant a lot that he was perceptive enough to understand how she felt and that he had made his friend aware that he was angry about that speech.
‘Yes, gioia mia. We Zaffaris take ourselves very seriously and if one is lucky enough to find a waitress like you in the snow he’s grateful for it, not suspicious. Apollo and I have a friendship based very much on the fact that we are opposites in character. He distrusts every woman he meets. He’s always looking for a hidden agenda. It must be exhausting,’ he said wryly.
Holly rested her brow against his shoulder as they slow-danced and she let the mortification and the anger seep slowly out of her again. It was being with Vito that was important, being with Vito and Angelo and becoming a family that really mattered. And in her heart of hearts she could not credit that Vito was planning a sham marriage purely to try and deprive her of their son. That accusation was hopefully the suggestion of a troubled, misogynistic mind, she reasoned hopefully.
*
‘This is your jet…like really? Your own jet?’ Holly carolled incredulously a few hours later when she scanned the ultra-opulent leather interior of the private jet.
‘I travel a great deal. It’s convenient,’ Vito parried, amused by her wide, shaken eyes.<
br />
‘As long as sleeping with the cabin crew isn’t included,’ Holly whispered, her attention resting on the more than usually attractive team overseeing the boarding of Lorenza and Angelo and all the baby equipment that accompanied her son. In consternation Holly realised that she had accidentally spoken that thought out loud.
Predominantly, Vito was shocked by the concept of having sex with anyone who worked for him and then he looked at his bride’s burning face and he started to laugh with rare enjoyment. ‘No, that sort of entertainment is probably more Apollo than me. Although I did take advantage of you.’
‘No, you didn’t,’ she told him before she hurried forward to grasp her son, having missed him during her enforced break from him throughout the day.
‘Older, wiser, plied an innocent with wine…’ Vito traded, condemning himself for his crime for her ears alone. ‘But if I had the chance to go back I would still do it again.’
Encountering a lingering sidewise glance from black-fringed dark golden eyes, Holly felt heat lick through her pelvis as she took a seat and cuddled Angelo. For possibly the first time since she had conceived she looked back at that night in the cottage without guilt and regret. No, on that score Vito had hit a bullseye. Given the chance, in spite of the moments of heartache and stress along the way, she would also still have done the same thing again.
And if Vito could be that honest, why shouldn’t she match him? Tell him about the phone call she had overheard Apollo making? She would pick her moment, she decided ruefully, and she would ask if he had ever thought of their marriage as a sham and if she had anything to worry about.
Angelo was asleep by the time they landed in Italy. Holly had freshened up, noting with disappointment that her outfit hadn’t travelled very well. The fashion stylist had tried to persuade her to buy a whole host of clothes but with Vito already paying for the wedding and her gown she hadn’t felt right about allowing him to pay for anything else before they were married. She had teamed an elegant navy-and-white skirt with a matching top but her get-up had creased horribly and looked as though she had worn it for a week rather than only a few hours. Straightening it as best she could, she wondered if Vito would even notice.