He’s the billionaire she loves to hate...
And now she’s having his baby!
Notorious Italian playboy Dante Cardinali lives life on the edge. So when Stella Montefiore dramatically confronts him, vowing to settle a family vendetta, he’s intrigued by her bravery...and enticed by their passionate attraction! It explodes into an intense and sizzling encounter...that leaves innocent Stella shockingly pregnant! Now to claim his heir, Dante must marry this dangerously alluring woman...
Feel the heat in this sizzling revenge romance
“That baby is mine.”
Dante sounded...possessive almost. As if he actually wanted the baby.
A hollow feeling opened up inside Stella, a kind of longing. But she ignored it. “How do you know the baby is yours?” she asked.
He snorted. “Darling, you were a virgin. It’s pretty much guaranteed that the child is mine.” Intention blazed suddenly in his eyes. “But if you require a paternity test, let’s take one.”
The way he looked at her made her tremble.
What was wrong with her? So he wanted the baby. So what? It wasn’t going to make any difference. He was still a mistake she had to correct. As soon as she figured him out.
“That won’t be necessary,” she said.
“Of course it won’t,” he echoed, something hard and certain in his voice. “Then again, it’ll probably be one of the things I’ll have to organize once we get back to my hotel, anyway.”
Stella frowned. “What do you mean ‘get back to your hotel’?”
Dante’s dark gaze was steely and utterly sure. “I mean that I’m leaving and I’m taking you and my child with me.”
Jackie Ashenden writes dark, emotional stories with alpha heroes who’ve just gotten the world to their liking only to have it blown apart by their kick-ass heroines. She lives in Auckland, New Zealand, with her husband, the inimitable Dr. Jax, two kids and two rats. When she’s not torturing alpha males and their gutsy heroines she can be found drinking chocolate martinis, reading anything she can lay her hands on, wasting time on social media or being forced to go mountain biking with her husband. To keep up-to-date with Jackie’s new releases and other news, sign up to her newsletter at jackieashenden.com.
Books by Jackie Ashenden
Harlequin Presents
Shocking Italian Heirs
Demanding His Hidden Heir
Harlequin DARE
The Knights of Ruin
Ruined
Destroyed
Kings of Sydney
King’s Price
King’s Rule
King’s Ransom
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Jackie Ashenden
Claiming His One-Night Child
To my dad. He’ll probably never read this book, but just in case he does... Hi, Dad.
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
EPILOGUE
EXCERPT FROM PRINCE'S VIRGIN IN VENICE BY TRISH MOREY
CHAPTER ONE
AS ONE OF Europe’s most notorious playboys, Dante Cardinali was used to waking up in strange beds. He was also used to beautiful women standing beside said beds and looking down at him. There had even been a couple of instances where he’d woken up with his wrists and ankles still cuffed, the way they clearly were now.
What was unfamiliar was the barrel of the gun pointed at his head.
Dante had never been a man who cared over much about anything, but one thing he did care about was himself. And his life. And the fact that the beautiful woman standing over him was holding a gun in a very competent grip.
The same beautiful woman who’d been in the VIP area of his favourite Monte Carlo club and with whom he’d spent some time...talking...because he hadn’t been in the mood for seduction—something that had been happening to him more often than not of late. It was a worrying trend if he thought about it too deeply, which he didn’t. Because he didn’t think about anything too deeply.
Whatever. He couldn’t remember how long he’d spent talking to her, because he couldn’t remember full-stop. In fact, he couldn’t remember much at all about the evening and, given his current situation, it probably meant he’d blacked out at some point.
What he did remember was the beautiful woman’s piercingly blue eyes, fractured through with silver like a shattered sky.
Those eyes were looking at him now with curious intentness, as if she was trying to decide whether or not to shoot him.
Well, considering his wrists and ankles were cuffed and he wasn’t dead already, it meant there was some doubt. And if there was some doubt, he could probably induce her to give in to it.
He could pretty much convince anyone to give in to anything if he put his mind to it.
‘Darling,’ he drawled, his mouth dry and his voice a little thick. ‘A gun is slightly overkill, don’t you think? If you want to sleep with me, just take your clothes off and come here. You don’t need to tie me to the bed.’ He frowned, his head suspiciously muzzy but beginning to clear. ‘Or put something in my drink, for that matter.’
The woman’s cool gaze—she had told him her name but he couldn’t remember it—didn’t waver. ‘I don’t want to sleep with you, Dante Cardinali,’ she said, her icy tone a slap of cold water on his hot skin. ‘What I would like very much is to kill you.’
So. She was trying to kill him and she was very serious.
He should probably be a little more concerned about that gun and the intent in her fascinating eyes, and he definitely was. But, strangely, his most prevalent emotion wasn’t fear. No, it was excitement.
It had been a long time since he’d felt anything like excitement.
It had been a long time since he’d felt anything at all.
He stared at her, conscious of a certain tightening of his muscles and a slight elevation in his heartbeat. ‘That seems extreme.’
‘It is extreme. Then again, the punishment fits the crime.’
The barrel of the gun didn’t waver an inch and yet she hadn’t pulled the trigger. Interesting. Why not?
He let his gaze rove over her, interest tugging at him.
She was very small, built petite and delicate like a china doll, with hair the colour of newly minted gold coins, falling in a straight and gleaming waterfall over her shoulders. Her precise features were as lovely as her figure—a determined chin, finely carved cheekbones and a perfect little bow of a mouth.
She wore a satin cocktail dress the same kind of silvery blue as her eyes and it looked like silky fluid poured over her body, outlining the delicious curves of her breasts and hips, skimming gently rounded thighs.
A lovely little china shepherdess of a woman. Just his type.
Apart from the gun in his face, of course.
‘What crime?’ Dante asked with interest. ‘Are you Sicilian by any chance? Is this a vendetta situation?’ It was a question purely designed to keep her talking, as he knew already that she wasn’t Sicilian. Her Italian held a cadence from a different part of the country
and one he was quite familiar with.
The sound of the island nation from where he’d been exiled along with the rest of the royal family years and years ago.
The island nation of which he’d once been a prince.
Monte Santa Maria.
‘No.’ Her tone was flat and very definite. ‘But you know that already, don’t you?’
Dante met her gaze. He was good at reading people—it was part of the reason he was so successful in the billion-dollar property-investment company he owned with his brother—and although this woman’s cool exterior seemed completely flawless he could see something flickering in the depths of her eyes. Uncertainty or indecision, he couldn’t tell which. Interesting. For all that she seemed competent and in charge, she still hadn’t pulled that trigger. And if she hadn’t done it now, she probably wouldn’t.
He’d seen killers before and this woman wasn’t one. In fact, he’d bet the entirety of Cardinal Developments on it.
‘Yes,’ he said, discreetly testing the cuffs on his ankles and wrists. They were firm. If he wanted to get out of them, she was going to have to unlock them. ‘Good catch. I love an intelligent woman.’
She took a step closer to the bed, the gun still unerringly pointed at his head. ‘You know what I love? A stupid man.’
Her nearness prompted a heady, blatantly sexual fragrance to flood over him, along with bits and pieces of his memory.
Ah, yes, it was all coming back to him now—sitting in his club in Monte Carlo, this pretty little thing catching his eye and smiling shyly. She’d been innocent and artless, a touch nervous and, despite her strongly sexual perfume, when she’d said it was her first time in a club he’d believed her.
He hadn’t been in the mood for small talk but, as he hadn’t been in the mood for seduction, and there had been something endearing about her nervousness, he’d sat beside her and chatted. He couldn’t remember a single thing about that conversation other than the fact that he hadn’t been as bored as he’d expected to be, as he so often was these days.
He was not bored now, though. Not in any way, shape or form.
She was looking at him coolly, like a scientist ready to dissect an insect, no trace of that shy, nervous woman he’d talked to in the club. Which must mean that it had been an act. An act he hadn’t spotted.
Oh, she was good. She was very good.
His heart rate sped up even further, the tug of interest becoming something stronger, hotter.
Are you insane? She wants to kill you and you want to bed her?
Was that any surprise? It had been too long since he’d had any kind of excitement in his life, too long since he’d had anything like a challenge. The closest he’d come to interesting had been when his older brother Enzo had married a lovely English woman and Dante had been tasked with making sure Enzo’s son behaved himself. A shockingly difficult task, given the boy had already decided that Dante was less uncle than partner in crime.
Dante had had to spend at least a week afterwards in the company of various lovely ladies simply to recover.
Marriage and children were not the kind of excitement he was after. They were too restrictive and far too...domestic for his sophisticated tastes.
Though, given the state of his groin, if a lovely woman could get him hard simply by waving a gun at him maybe his tastes had grown a little too sophisticated even for him.
Then again, it didn’t look as though he was going to be able to escape any time soon, unless he charmed his way out. It wouldn’t be the first time that he’d used his considerable physical appeal to manipulate a situation and this was a situation that definitely required some degree of manipulation.
And besides. It might be fun.
‘Stupid, hmm? Maybe I am.’ He allowed himself to relax, looking up at her from underneath his lashes. ‘Or maybe I knew who you were all along and simply wanted to see what you wanted from me.’
Her lovely mouth curved in a faint, cool smile. ‘I see. In that case, care to enlighten me on why you’re here?’
Dante raised a brow. ‘Isn’t that your job? I’m still waiting for your villain monologue.’
‘Oh, no, you apparently know all about it already, so don’t let me stop you.’ She cocked her head, the light gleaming on her golden hair. ‘I’d like to hear it so, please, go on.’
Adrenaline flooded through him in a hot burst. This was getting more and more interesting by the second. And so was she, playing him at his own game. Little witch.
He allowed his gaze to roam over her, giving himself some time to collect his thoughts. If she wanted him to give her the run down on what he thought was going on so far, then he was happy to oblige her. Especially as he was starting to get some idea.
If she was from Monte Santa Maria—and that seemed certain—then the most obvious explanation for his current predicament was an issue with his family. The Cardinalis had once been rulers of Monte Santa Maria, at least until Dante’s father had mismanaged the country so badly that the government had removed him from his throne and exiled their entire family.
Luca Cardinali hadn’t earned them any friends during his troubled reign.
So, did that mean she was from a family whom Luca had wronged? She looked young—younger than he was—and he’d only been eleven when their family had had to leave, so she was likely to be someone’s daughter.
He didn’t remember much of his Monte Santa Marian history—he’d tried his best to forget about his country entirely—but he seemed to recall an aristocratic family who’d been famous for their beauty, and most especially their golden hair.
‘Well, if you insist,’ he said. ‘Your accent is familiar—from Monte Santa Maria, if I’m not much mistaken—and, given your general antipathy towards me, it’s likely you’re someone my father wronged at some point.’ He watched her lovely face intently. ‘But you’re young, so I don’t imagine Luca wronged you personally, but your family. And, given your accent again, I would say you’re from one of the aristocratic families. Probably...’ His brain finally settled on the name it had been looking for. ‘Montefiore.’
Something in her shattered sky eyes flared. Shock.
So. He’d been right. How satisfying.
‘Guess work,’ she said dismissively, her chin lifting, her hold on the gun tightening. ‘You know nothing.’
‘And you are very good at pretending.’ He smiled. ‘If you’re going to pull the trigger, darling, you’d better do it now. Or do you want the suspense to kill me before you do?’
‘You think this is a joke?’
‘With that gun in my face? Obviously not. But, if you imagine this is the first time I’ve woken up tied to a bed, you’d be wrong.’
‘This isn’t some sex game, Cardinali.’
‘Clearly. If it was, you’d be naked and so would I, and you’d be calling me Dante. Or screaming it, rather.’
A whisper of colour stained her pale cheekbones and he didn’t miss the way her gaze flicked down his body and then back up again, as if she couldn’t help herself.
Excellent. It would appear she wasn’t immune to him after all.
His satisfaction with the whole situation deepened, not to mention his excitement. This was indeed going to be a lot more fun than he’d initially envisaged.
Her jaw had tightened. ‘You seem very casual for a man who’s about to die.’
Apparently she didn’t like his attitude. Well, not many people did.
‘And if I was really about to die, I would be dead already. But, no, you put something in my drink, dealt with my bodyguards, somehow managed to transport me to...’ he took a brief glance around the room which looked like a standard five-star hotel room ‘...wherever this is. Cuffed me to the bed. Waited until I woke up, then started talking to me instead of pulling that trigger.’ He allowed his voice to deepen and become lazier, more sensual. ‘And, dar
ling, considering that little look you gave me just now, it’s not killing that you want to do to me. It’s something else entirely.’ He let his smile become hot, the smile that had charmed women the world over and had never failed him yet. ‘In which case, be my guest. You’ve already got me all tied up. I’m completely at your mercy.’
* * *
Stella Montefiore had never thought killing Dante Cardinali would be easy. He was rich, important and more or less constantly surrounded by people, which made getting an opportunity to take him down very, very difficult.
But since she’d taken on the mission she’d spent at least six months planning how to get access to him and, now she had, her family was counting on her to go through with it. Especially her father.
It was a just revenge for his son’s death and a chance to reclaim the lost honour of the Montefiores. It was also her chance at redemption for her brother’s death, a death for which her parents still hadn’t forgiven her, and she did not want to make any mistakes. There was no room for error.
In fact, everything had gone completely to plan, and here he was, at her mercy, just as he’d said.
So why couldn’t she pull that trigger?
He was lying on the bed in the hotel room she’d managed to get him into with the help of the hotel staff, having told them he was drunk, and he was cuffed hand and foot. He shouldn’t be dangerous in the slightest.
And yet...
There was something about the way he took up space on the bed, all long and lean and muscular, the fabric of his expensive black trousers and plain white shirt pulling across his powerful chest and thighs. Not to mention the lazy way he looked at her from underneath his long, thick, black lashes, the glints of gold in his dark eyes like coins on the bottom of a lake-bed. Completely unfazed. As if he dealt with guns in his face every day and it didn’t bother him in the slightest.
And it didn’t help that he was so ridiculously beautiful in an intensely masculine way. All aristocratic cheekbones, a hard jawline, straight nose and the most perfectly carved mouth she’d ever seen. A fallen angel’s face with a warrior’s body, and the kind of fierce sexual magnetism that drew people to him, whatever their gender.
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