Scandals Of The Powerful: Uncovering the Correttis / A Legacy of Secrets (Sicily's Corretti Dynasty) / An Invitation to Sin (Sicily's Corretti Dynasty) (Mills & Boon M&B)

by Carol Marinelli

  Of course you’re beautiful, Mama. Of course he loves you. The other women don’t mean anything.

  Unsettled by the emergence of that unwanted memory, he drained his glass and allowed it to be filled again. Why was he thinking about that now when he hadn’t thought about it for years? ‘He’ll be replaced.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Because I know my cousin. He has many faults, but failing isn’t one of them. He’s too competitive. Now stop worrying.’

  ‘Aren’t you worried about your brother?’

  Luca shrugged. ‘Why would I be worried?’

  ‘He ran off with your cousin’s bride-to-be!’

  ‘That’s his problem, not mine. Now try this—it’s delicious.’ He spooned caponata onto her plate and watched as she dissected it with her fork. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Looking for its spleen.’

  ‘It’s vegetable, dolcezza. Vegetables don’t have spleens.’

  ‘This dish is vegetarian? You promise?’ Cautiously she tasted a small amount and moaned. ‘It’s delicious.’

  He watched as her eyes closed and she savoured the flavours. Her tongue licked at a tiny drop of oil on her lips. She was the most sensual woman he’d met and yet she suppressed it ruthlessly. ‘Locally grown food and good olive oil. It doesn’t come any better.’

  ‘I don’t want to know that it’s cooked in oil. So are all Sicilian kids raised on this? Did your mother make this for you when you were small?’

  Mention of his mother wiped his own appetite coming after his own thoughts on that topic. ‘No. My mother wasn’t the hearth and home type. She had other priorities.’ He reached for his glass and changed the subject. ‘Did yours cook for you?’

  ‘No. My mother wasn’t the hearth and home type either.’ The poise didn’t slip, but he heard something in her voice. The same dark undertones that coloured his own.

  Her too?

  They had more in common than either of them could have imagined.

  ‘So what type was she?’ He surprised himself by asking the question because normally he had no interest in delving beneath the surface of the person he was with and maybe he surprised her too, because she didn’t answer immediately.

  ‘The ambitious type. She had big plans for me.’

  ‘She didn’t want you to be an actress?’

  ‘It was all she wanted.’ She kept her eyes down so that all he could see was the dark fan of her lashes as she concentrated on her food. ‘She was determined I would achieve what she hadn’t and determined I would be the one to save the family fortunes. She was a single parent and money was tight. When I was a newborn she signed me up for work. I appeared in a daytime soap as someone’s baby, then I played toddlers and so it went on. I worked right through my childhood. I didn’t go to school—I had tutors on the set.’

  ‘And you hated it?’

  ‘No.’ She stabbed her knife through a piece of asparagus. ‘I was living every kid’s dream.’

  ‘Is that what she told you?’

  Her eyes lifted to his and just for a moment he saw a little girl, lost and friendless. Then the look was gone. ‘I had the most amazing experiences. I’ve travelled to places most people only dream about. Our house was always full of famous people.’

  ‘So if it was so fantastic why did you fire her?’

  Her face was white, her fingers shaking as she reached for her champagne. ‘She was my manager and I decided she didn’t have my best interests at heart.’

  She was back in control, her insecurities masked by the poised smile she’d perfected. It was as if that unguarded moment had never happened.

  ‘What about your father?’

  ‘My father played no part in my life until he sold his story to the press when I was seventeen.’ Lifting her glass, she took a sip. ‘Are we done talking about me? Because the journalists outside the restaurant are beginning to create an obstruction. It isn’t fair on the other diners. They have a right to eat their meal in peace. We should probably skip dessert and leave.’

  Luca turned his head and felt a flash of shock as he registered the size of the press pack. ‘Cristo, is it always like this?’

  ‘No. Sometimes it’s really bad. Today is a quiet day.’ Calm, she rose to her feet. ‘Shall we go?’

  *

  Taylor walked through the tables, acknowledging greetings with a polite smile, hiding her dismay at the number of journalists hovering in wait.

  Maybe it was tiredness, maybe it was vulnerability caused by the fact that he’d forced her to talk about things she didn’t normally talk about. Maybe it was worry about the film part, but suddenly her control slipped and she stopped dead.

  Luca took her hand. ‘Ready? We need to look like two people in love as we walk out of this restaurant.’

  ‘I hate them.’ She blurted the words out before she could stop herself and he turned with a frown on his face. ‘I can’t face them.’

  ‘Taylor—’

  ‘They’re like hunters, looking for weakness. When they find it they savage you.’

  And they’d find hers.

  It was only a matter of time before they exposed the one thing she dreaded them exposing. The threat of it had hung over her for so long she could no longer remember how it felt to live without it. It was a constant surprise to her that it hadn’t come out before now.

  Luca pulled her into the curve of his arm and Taylor gasped.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘You give them too much power over you,’ he said softly, his lips in her hair so that no one watching could lip-read or overhear his words. ‘Rule number one, be who you really are. It’s far more uncomfortable living a lie than living the truth. Rule number two, never let the enemy know your weakness. Now we’re going to go out there and you’re going to smile or not, whichever you prefer, but you’re not going to show them that they scare you, capisci?’

  His body pressed against hers, hard and powerful, and she realised that he hadn’t been pawing her but protecting her. The way he’d angled his body had prevented the press from seeing her sudden panic.

  Thrown to discover he was capable of sensitivity, she swallowed. ‘I have no idea what capisci means but I assume it’s some unspeakable part of an animal that you probably just fed me.’

  The corners of his mouth flickered into a smile. ‘Lift your chin. The first rule of hiding something is not to look as if you’re hiding it.’

  ‘I’m not hiding anything.’

  ‘You’re hiding more secrets than MI5, tesoro, but now is not the time to talk about them. Now smile that perfect smile you’ve perfected—the one that tells the world everything is good in your life even when it sucks.’

  Taylor smiled obediently and he took her hand firmly in his and led her across the vine-covered terrace, down some steps and onto the street.

  His hand tightened on hers. ‘You are thinking only of me,’ he murmured, ‘you’re not interested in them because you’re so in love with me.’

  She just had time to mutter ‘in your dreams’ before they were mobbed.

  ‘Luca, Luca! Can we get a picture of you together?’

  ‘When is the wedding?’

  ‘When did you first meet Taylor?’

  There was no such thing as privacy, Taylor thought numbly. There was no question they wouldn’t ask. No secret that they wouldn’t unearth and expose. They had no limits.

  She thought of what they didn’t know and turned cold.

  It would come out. It always came out.

  She hadn’t realised she’d stopped walking until she felt Luca’s arm tighten round her. ‘You’ve already had more than enough pictures of us together.’ He spoke in that lazy drawl that made it sound as if he didn’t have a care in the world. ‘The wedding will be when we decide it will be and you will most certainly not be invited. Now go and bother someone else.’ Gently but firmly he nudged her forward, deflecting the barrage of intrusive questions with casual charm as he guided her to the
car.

  She envied the ease with which he dealt with them and she left him to do just that and was just about to climb into the passenger seat when he threw her the keys.

  ‘You’re driving.’

  ‘You can’t be serious?’

  ‘You’ve had one mouthful of champagne. I intend to take advantage of that. Not to mention the fact that you could barely keep your hands off the wheel earlier. Admit it, you’re longing to take this baby for a spin.’

  ‘One car is exactly the same as another to me.’

  He smiled. ‘Right.’

  It drove her mad that he knew her so well after five minutes in her company. ‘I’m not a speed merchant like you.’

  That maddening smile widened. ‘Of course you’re not.’

  Since her act was obviously wasted on him, Taylor slid behind the wheel, promising herself that she wasn’t going to drive fast. No way. She was going to prove that a car like this could be driven sedately. She was going to prove he was wrong about her.

  Luca stretched out his legs and rolled his eyes. ‘Any time in the next century would be good.’

  ‘I’m taking my time.’

  ‘And while you’re taking your time, they’re snapping away,’ he murmured under his breath. ‘Snap, snap, snappety snap. Unless you want tomorrow’s headlines to be Taylor Carmichael Forgets How to Drive, I suggest you make a move.’

  Horrified by that prospect, Taylor pressed her foot down and the car roared and sprang forward like a racehorse out of the starting gate. ‘Oh, I love this.’ The words burst from her spontaneously and he smiled.

  ‘So drive it. I presume you have no objection to speed on this occasion, my little petal? Let’s lose them, shall we?’ With a wolfish smile, Luca put his hand on her thigh and pressed her foot to the floor.

  Taylor gasped and heads turned as the engine of the supercar screamed. The paparazzi jumped out of the way and she flinched back in her seat.

  ‘Did I kill anyone?’

  He glanced over his shoulder. ‘Sadly, no. But if you slam it into reverse now and spin the wheel to the right you might just get lucky.’

  ‘You’re terrible.’ She gave a snort of laughter and accelerated away, the power making her moan with pleasure. ‘I’ve never driven anything like this before.’

  ‘I can tell. Speed up. If they’re going to chase us at least give them something to chase.’

  ‘You’re an exhibitionist.’

  ‘This from a woman who ripped her dress at a celebrity wedding.’

  ‘You ripped the dress.’

  ‘And great fun it was too. I’m partial to naked thigh, particularly when it’s wrapped around me.’

  She felt a rush of relief as they left the photographers behind and she had to admit that the car was sublime. There was something illicit and wickedly good about the power she now controlled. ‘Are they following us?’

  Tilting his handsome head, he glanced in the rearview mirror. ‘Strangely enough, no. Clearly they think we’re off to have boring almost-married sex which no longer makes us worth following.’

  ‘I wish.’ She changed gear smoothly and he raised an eyebrow.

  ‘You wish we were having almost-married sex?’

  ‘No! I meant that I wish they thought we’re not worth following.’ Flustered by the way he made her feel, she shifted gear slightly too early and saw him wince.

  ‘Premature gear-change, dolcezza. Keep her hanging on until she’s desperate—then you give her what she wants.’

  She felt her cheeks burn. ‘Is everything about sex to you?’

  ‘This car is all about sex and you know it.’

  Taylor kept her eyes fixed on the road. She was trying really hard not to think about sex around this man. Quickly, she changed the subject. ‘Thank you for what you did back there.’

  ‘You mean when I chipped your frozen, terrified carcass off the ground? Want to tell me what that sudden panic attack was all about?’

  No.

  ‘It wasn’t a panic attack.’ Ahead of her the setting sun dipped low on the horizon, touching the sea and sending slivers of red across the darkening surface while the soft evening breeze whispered across her face and whipped at her hair.

  It was a blissful, perfect moment and Taylor wished she could freeze time and keep things this simple for ever but that wasn’t life, was it?

  She was aware of Luca watching her, his expression veiled by thick dark lashes. ‘You were scared.’

  ‘Journalists do that to me.’ Her hair tangled in front of her face and she pushed it away, hating the fact that her fingers were still shaking. She had so much to hide and deep down she knew it was only a matter of time before it all came out. And when it did... ‘They wrecked my life.’ And they’d wreck it again without a moment of hesitation.

  ‘You mean they wrote stuff about you. You’re too sensitive.’

  ‘They wrote about private things. Things that were none of their business. And they lie—’ The wind dried her lips and she licked at them. ‘Do you honestly not care when they do that?’

  ‘No. If people want to write about me they can go ahead. But I’m not ashamed of who I am. Unlike you.’

  ‘I’m not ashamed! I’m—’ She kept her eyes on the road. ‘Private. People change. I’m not the same person I was at ten, or seventeen or even twenty-four, so I don’t want to have to stare at that version of me when I switch on my computer or open a magazine. And yes, there are things I wish I hadn’t done. Things I’d do differently if I had my time again.’ Things she regretted deeply.

  Her past lurked out there like a beast in the shadows and she knew it was going to pounce. Suddenly she wished she could keep driving into the sunset. Vanish and live a different life.

  On impulse, she pulled in by the side of the road and stared at the view. ‘It’s so beautiful.’

  ‘Sicily is the most beautiful island in the world. That’s why I try and spend as much time here as I can.’

  The phone in her bag pinged to signify a message, disturbing the moment, and Taylor reached across him eagerly and pulled it out of her bag. ‘With luck this will be good news on the director situation.’

  But it wasn’t and her excitement turned to sick panic as she read the words on the screen.

  Her hands grew clammy and her phone almost slid from her fingers.

  She wanted to hurl it off the cliff, as if that simple gesture might cut her off from her past and keep her safe. But she knew there was no point. Whatever she did, her past would always haunt her. He would always haunt her.

  ‘Trouble?’ Luca was watching her and she tried desperately to pull herself together.

  ‘No.’ She shut off her phone and slipped it back into her bag.

  ‘For an actress, you’re a terrible liar.’

  She knew she wasn’t a terrible liar but she was fast discovering that Luca Corretti, for all his reputation as a shallow playboy, was sharp as a razor. ‘I’m not lying. Just tired. I wish the press would disappear.’

  ‘You care too much about what people think.’

  ‘You have no idea what it’s like.’ The lump in her throat appeared from nowhere. ‘No idea what it’s like having cameras filming your every move from your first step to your first boyfriend. No idea what it’s like to be betrayed by the people closest to you—people who are supposed to care about you and love you—and no idea how it feels to wake up and realise the only person in the world you can trust is yourself.’ Her outburst shocked her almost as much as it clearly shocked him.

  Taylor sat there, wondering how to pull back the words and recover the situation. She was usually so good at hiding her feelings but from the first moment she’d met Luca Corretti those feelings had been perilously close to the surface.

  ‘Sorry.’ Her voice was husky. ‘Ignore me. It’s been a difficult few days for me and today has been the most difficult of all.’

  ‘Why are you apologising? For once, you were honest about your feelings.’ Luca stared straight ahead, s
unglasses hiding his eyes. Then he turned to look at her and when he spoke there was no trace of his usual humour. ‘We should go. Do you want me to drive?’

  ‘No.’ She was grateful to him for not delving further but of course he wouldn’t, would he? That sort of confession probably came under the heading of ‘emotional depth’ and Luca Corretti was a man who avoided ‘emotional depth’ at all costs.

  He was no doubt already trying to find ways to ease himself out of their ‘fake’ engagement because who would want to be engaged to someone as messed up as her?

  It took another ten minutes to get back to Luca’s house and, as the car purred through the security gates, she spotted cameras and two security guards.

  ‘You say you’re not worried about the press but you have very high-level security.’

  ‘That’s to protect me from all the women I’ve upset. And all the ones I haven’t yet upset, but probably will in the future.’ He was back to his normal self, his tone smooth and bored, and was relieved he clearly didn’t intend to question her further about her past.

  ‘I would have thought you needed an army for that.’

  ‘Fortunately for me I now have a fiancée.’ The tyres crunched on the gravel and he sprang from the car and opened the door for her in an old-fashioned gesture that surprised her. ‘I hate the word, but the institution might prove more useful than I could ever have imagined.’

  ‘So now you’re using me as a female defence system?’

  ‘Something like that.’ He relieved her of the car keys. ‘You drive well for a woman.’

  ‘That is so patronising. If I’d known you were going to say something like that I would have wrapped your precious Ferrari round a lamppost.’

  The banter felt so much more comfortable than confidences but just being with him unsettled her. She was used to spending her time around ridiculously attractive men—men who spent their days working on their physique, men who spent a considerable time in front of the mirror, none of whom tempted her. Luca was different. He was spectacularly handsome, that was true, his Sicilian bloodline evident in his darkly brooding features and his volatile personality, but for her the attraction lay deeper. She was drawn to his self-confidence, his lack of pretentiousness and, most of all, his innate honesty. Luca Corretti didn’t waste time putting a barrier between himself and the world and if they came too close, he simply shrugged.