The Temporary Mrs. Marchetti (Mills & Boon Modern)

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  Oh, how she had missed this!

  No one made her feel so...so energised. So vital. So...aroused.

  She kept her gaze locked on his. The air was so charged with static she could hear it like a fizzing roar in her ears. ‘What are you going to do, Cristiano? Lug me over your shoulder and carry me off like the caveman you really are underneath that smart Armani suit?’

  Another ripple of tension passed over his rigidly set mouth, his eyes blazing as they tussled with hers. His hand left the top of his car door and snared one of hers before she could do anything to counter it—if she had wanted to, that was—ruthlessly tugging her towards him so there was barely a breath of air between their bodies. Alice could feel the slight protrusion of his belt buckle digging her in the stomach, a shockingly erotic reminder of the latent male power stirring just below it.

  ‘Been a long time between drinks, has it, cara?’ he asked in that dangerously smooth tone.

  Alice huffed out a laugh but it didn’t come out quite as convincing as she would have liked. It sounded breathless. Uncertain. Out of its depth. ‘You don’t get to hear about my love-life. It’s none of your business.’

  His fingers subtly tightened around her wrist, his touch a band of fire that sent lightning-fast currents of hot electricity straight to her core. ‘It will become my business once we’re married next month.’

  Next month? Eek!

  Alice elevated her chin, sending him a look of undiluted disdain. ‘You seem to have a big problem understanding the concept of the word no. I’m. Not. Marrying. You.’

  His top lip lifted in a sardonic curl. ‘You want me so bad I can smell it.’

  Alice disguised a quick swallow. She could smell it too. The musk and salt of arousal coming off both of them like a black magic potion. A swirling wicked spell. Its dangerous tentacles were wrapping around her body, coiling like a serpent, strangling her resolve until it was gasping for air.

  Only he could do this to her. Make her so wild with need she forgot everything but the greedy hunger in her body clamouring for satiation.

  His thighs were flush against hers, the swell of his erection so powerfully male—so blatantly, unashamedly male—it made every feminine cell in her body roll over and beg. Somehow—miraculously—she managed to conjure up a mocking smile. ‘That ego of yours is so big it deserves its own postcode. Or its own government.’

  A spark of amusement lit his gaze and his fingers around her wrist loosened slightly, his thumb stroking in a fainéant movement over the hummingbird leap of her pulse. ‘Did you miss what we had together?’

  Alice schooled her features into a mask of cool indifference. ‘Not a bit.’

  His probing gaze kept hers captive. ‘So why haven’t you had a serious relationship since?’

  How on God’s sweet earth did he know that?

  Alice arched a brow. ‘None that you know about. Unlike you, I don’t live my life followed by paparazzi documenting every time I sneeze.’

  ‘When was your last relationship?’

  She flicked her eyelids upwards. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, what is this? Twenty questions?’

  His gaze didn’t waver. ‘A long time, then.’

  Alice pursed her lips and then released them with a rush of air. ‘Are we having dinner or are we going to stand here and swap dating histories? I can get you a list of name and numbers if you’d like? I could even do a printout of some of their messages and emails if that gives you a hard-on.’

  Cristiano put his hand back on top of the rim of the car door. ‘That won’t be necessary.’

  Alice brushed past him to get in the car, shooting him a glare through the windscreen when he strode in front of the car to take his place behind the wheel. He started the engine with a powerful roar and entered the traffic with a quick glance over his shoulder, the G-force sending her back against the butter-soft leather seat.

  Why did his driving always remind her of sex?

  The thunderous growl of his engine, the thrusting of the gears, the press on the brakes and the push down on the throttle made her think of all the times he had taken her to bed—or other places—and driven them both to paradise.

  Alice’s gaze went to his hands holding the steering wheel with such indolent confidence, the long, tanned fingers with their dusting of dark hair doing all sorts of strange things to her insides. What was it about those hands that made her squirm with need? How was she to get through an evening with him? Sitting across the table with him at a restaurant, for God’s sake?

  How the hell had he got her to agree to dinner?

  That was one of the scariest things about Cristiano Marchetti. He had an unnerving ability to get her to do things she had no intention of doing.

  But...

  That tricky little ‘but’ kept gnawing at the wainscoting of her mind. But what if she did agree to it? Six months was nothing. It would flash past. And at the end of it she would be set up financially. For life. She could build her wedding spa with money to spare. She could buy the best equipment, lavishly decorate the place without the limitations of a budget. She could take a holiday—something she hadn’t done in years.

  Alice chewed it over... He was expecting her to say no. But wait a minute... What if he didn’t want her to say yes? What if he was only making all this fuss to make her think he was keen to get that ring on her finger?

  She smiled a secret smile. She would string him along for a while longer and then she would call his bluff and expose his true motivations.

  Married for six months to her mortal enemy?

  Game on.

  CHAPTER THREE

  CRISTIANO OPENED AND closed the fingers of his right hand where they were gripping the steering wheel. He could still feel the hot tingle of Alice’s skin against his fingertips. His lust for her was pounding like a jungle drum deep in his body. He ached with it. Burned with it. Vibrated with it. No one but her could reduce him to this. To stir in him such primitive, out of control longings. Longings he had never felt for anyone else. Longings that made a mockery of the sex he’d had before her and since.

  Not that he hadn’t had great sex over the years. He had. Many times. He’d made a point of it—using every sexual encounter to drive home the point to himself he could live without her.

  It was just that in comparison to what he’d shared with Alice...well, it wasn’t in the same league. Her body, her touch, her wildcat-on-heat response to him triggered something in him. Something indefinable. Something that made his flesh shudder in reaction when she came near. Something that, even now, with her sitting less than a half a metre away, he could feel moving through his body like the aftershocks of an earthquake.

  He had to get her out of his system.

  He had to.

  He could no longer tolerate the rush of adrenalin every time he saw a silver-blonde head in the crowd and the savage drop of his gut afterwards when he realised it wasn’t her. He had to prove to himself he was over her.

  Was this why his nonna had set her will up this way? To help him move past the five-foot-six blonde roadblock in his life? To force him to confront the failure he would give anything to forget?

  Cristiano had made a promise to himself not to sleep with Alice. Look, but don’t touch. But how long was that going to last? He was barely keeping his hands off her now. All he had to do was reach over and stroke his hand down the slim flank of her thigh peeping out from above the knee-high hem of her little black dress.

  His fingers twitched against the steering wheel. His groin growled when she crossed one long leg over the other, her racehorse-slim ankle moving up and down as if she were feeling the same restless agitation he was feeling.

  Of course she was.

  Cristiano allowed himself an internal smile. His ego had nothing to do with it. He could see the struggle she was having controlling her desire for him. He had felt it from the moment he’d stepped into her office and seen her sitting like a starchy schoolmistress behind that desk. She’d used the desk
as a barrier. She hadn’t trusted herself to get too close to him. She knew her body would betray her as his was doing to him. It was the way they were together. Match and tinder. Spark and flame. Trigger and explosion.

  It was only a matter of time before he had her where he wanted her. Begging him. Clawing at him with those little wildcat claws. Gasping his name between panting breaths as he showed her what she’d been missing. What he’d been missing. Dear God, how he’d missed it! Missed her. The feistiness of her. The razor-sharp wit of her tongue. The flashpoint temper and the come-and-get-me teasing that had made him feel as if he were living on the edge of a vertiginous cliff.

  The way her body felt around him when he drove in to the hilt.

  Getting her to marry him was his goal, not sleeping with her...although if what he had seen from her so far was any indication, sleeping with her might happen sooner rather than later. A little financial blackmail was not his usual modus operandi, but he had to get her married to him otherwise his shares would be lost.

  Not to mention the villa.

  He couldn’t lose that. It was the place where his father had grown up. It was where Cristiano had spent numerous happy family holidays before his parents’ and brother’s death. It was his home for the rest of his childhood and adolescence, the place where overnight he had grown from boy to man. Losing the villa would be like losing even more of his family than he had lost already.

  Why had his grandmother done such an outrageous thing as to force him to share it with Alice?

  He didn’t need a conscience right now. Six months would pass before he knew it. He would insist on Alice living with him because he wasn’t going to let the press get wind of there being anything amiss with his ‘marriage’. No way was Alice Piper going to make a laughing stock out of him in the daily tabloids. He would enjoy making her act the role of devoted wife. It would be amusing to see her push against the boundaries he laid down.

  ‘So, we’ll have a nice dinner and discuss this situation we find ourselves in,’ Cristiano said after a time.

  ‘Discuss?’ Alice’s voice held a generous note of scorn. ‘You don’t discuss. You command.’

  He sent her a smiling glance. ‘And as my wife you will obey.’

  Even from the other side of the car he could feel the heat coming off her livid blue glare. ‘They have rewritten the marriage ceremony since the nineteen-fifties, you know. Women no longer have to obey their husbands. Not that you’re going to be my hus—’

  ‘We’ll have a month-long engagement as the will specifies,’ Cristiano said. ‘You either marry me at the end of it or find yourself paying a rent you can ill afford.’

  Her face was a picture of impotent outrage, almost puce instead of her natural creamy colour. ‘You...you bastard.’ Her hands curled into tight little balls as if she was tempted to fly at his face and was only just stopping herself. ‘You scheming bastard.’

  He gave a careless shrug. ‘Sticks and stones.’

  It was a while before she said anything. Cristiano wondered if she were thinking things over, running her mind over the figures, so to speak. She ran a good business, he had to give her that, but it would not survive a big hike in rent. And to get her to do what he wanted, he was prepared to go as high as it took.

  Whatever it took.

  ‘Why engaged for a month?’ she said. ‘If you’re in such a hurry to get a ring on my finger then why not frogmarch me to a register office right away?’

  ‘I’m not having anyone speculate on why we’re not having a proper wedding, that’s why,’ Cristiano said, wondering if she was speaking figuratively or if she was changing her mind about marrying him.

  ‘But you can’t really mean to go to such lengths? I mean, a wedding is a big expense.’

  ‘I can afford it.’

  There was another silence.

  ‘All right.’ Her breath came out in a whoosh. ‘You win. I’ll marry you.’

  Cristiano hadn’t expected such a rapid capitulation. He’d thought she would have fought it a little longer and a little harder. But then he wondered if she had a counter plan. She was clever. Whip-smart and streetwise. What devious plan had she cooked up? Did she intend to make him suffer every minute they were engaged? Did she really think she could outmanoeuvre him? He smiled another private smile.

  Who knew this could be so much fun?

  ‘I’m glad you’re starting to see the positive side of our circumstances. It’s a win-win for both of us, sì?’

  The look she gave him would have sent a swarm of wasps running for cover. ‘Everyone’s going to know this is a farce the moment we’re seen out in public together.’

  ‘Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong, tesoro,’ Cristiano said. ‘We’re going to act like a happy and devoted couple at all times and in all public spaces.’

  A spluttering noise came from her side of the car. ‘Not on your life—’

  ‘Apart from when we’re alone,’ he continued as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Then the claws can come out. I’m quite looking forward to it, actually.’ He gave her another goading smile. ‘It will be like old times, yes?’

  Her eyes were spitting chips of blue ice, her mouth set in such a tight line her lushly shaped lips all but disappeared. Her whole body seemed to be shaking with rage. He could feel the vibration of it from his side of the car.

  ‘Why are you doing this? Why? Why? Why?’

  Why was he?

  Good question. It wasn’t just the shares, although that was a big part of it. It was more the sense of wanting to rewrite the past. To be in control this time. To be in charge of his emotions and passions. To be the one who told her when it was over, not the other way around. He was not going to be that person ever again—the person left behind. He had been that person as a child of eleven.

  Left behind by his family.

  The shock of that loss had never left him. Sometimes he could still feel that claw of despair in his chest, dragging, tearing at his organs. That terrible day when his grandparents had delivered the devastating news of the death of his parents and brother, he had felt as if he were the only person left on the planet.

  Alone.

  Abandoned.

  Isolated.

  It was the same feeling he’d felt when Alice walked out on his proposal. He stood in the middle of that crowded restaurant feeling as if a wall of thick glass were separating him from everyone else. No one could reach him. He could not reach them. He was blocked. Imprisoned in a cage along with his frustrated hopes and shattered dreams.

  ‘We have unfinished business, Alice.’

  ‘No. We. Don’t.’ Her words came out like hard pellets. ‘Our business is finished. Kaput. Over. Dead and buried.’

  Cristiano parked the car before he swivelled in his seat to look at her. She was sitting with her arms stiffly folded, her legs crossed, and her ankle jerking up and down as if she had a tic. ‘It’s not though, is it, cara? It’s not one little bit finished.’

  Her eyes met his and her throat moved up and down over a swallow like a small creature moving under a rug. But then she lowered her gaze to a point just below the knot of his tie. He heard her take a breath that sounded more like a shudder than a breath. ‘You always did play dirty.’

  ‘I play to win,’ he said. ‘So do you. It’s why we clash so much.’

  Her eyes came back to his. Hard. Bright. Flashing with such palpable rage he could feel it throbbing in the air that separated them. ‘I won’t let you win this, Cristiano. You might be able to blackmail me into marrying you, but you can’t make me fall in love with you. That’s what you want, isn’t it? You want me to fall in love with you and then throw it back in my face like I threw back yours.’

  ‘On the contrary, falling in love with me would be most inadvisable,’ Cristiano said. ‘Falling into bed with me? Well, that may be worth considering.’

  Her eyes went as wide as the steering wheel he was resting his arm across. ‘But you said you don’t—’

  ‘A
man can change his mind, can’t he?’

  Her mouth opened and shut a couple of times, two flags of pink riding high on her cheekbones. ‘I’m not going to sleep with you. I don’t care how much you blackmail me.’

  ‘Fine. Probably better that way.’ He opened his door and proceeded to get out. ‘I can get my needs met elsewhere.’

  She sprang out of the car before he could get round to her side. ‘Oh, no, you don’t,’ she said, hands on hips. ‘You don’t get to cheat on me. No way. If you can have lovers then so can I.’

  Cristiano slowly shook his head as if dealing with a small, wilfully disobedient child. ‘No. I’m the one who makes the rules. You follow them.’

  She came at him with a pointed finger, drilling him in the chest like a tiny outraged jackhammer. ‘I’m not obeying any of your stupid rules. I’m going to do what I damn well like and you can’t stop me.’

  Cristiano captured her hand, every cell in his body aching to tug her flush against him and show her what she was doing to him. But he was biding his time, waiting for her to come to him, as he knew in his bones she would. Her fiery nature stirred the banked-down embers of his. The heat was rising in a wildfire of lust, thundering through him like a runaway train on a steep decline.

  He wanted her.

  Oh, how he wanted her.

  It was a thirst he couldn’t quench with anyone else. A hunger that refused to be satisfied with another’s touch. She was in his blood. In his body. She was a fever that had lain dormant until he had walked into her beauty salon and seen her sitting there with that coolly indifferent look on her face.

  She wasn’t indifferent to him. Not one little bit. He could see it in her eyes, the way they kept darting to his mouth and the way her tongue swept over her lips as if recalling the taste and feel of his crushed to its softness.

  Cristiano slid one hand up her warm, silky smooth thigh. ‘If we weren’t in a public place I would take you right here and now.’

  She pushed back from him as if he had suddenly burst into scorching flames. ‘Get away from me.’