The Ranieri Bride

A sudden gasp broke from her as the pair of black leather shoes that appeared in front of her took her by surprise; she had not heard Enrico move.

She looked at the same moment that he bent to grasp her elbows. The next thing she knew she was being propelled to her feet by hands that were not gentle.

‘What the—?’ she began, but his mouth took the rest away, crushing her lips with a hard, bruising kiss that completely stole her breath.

She tasted of Freya and she smelled of Freya and she kissed him back like Freya always did whether she wanted to kiss him or not! Enrico thought angrily. And he wished he knew why the hell he was kissing her at all, when what he should be doing was throwing her out of his life the way he had done the last time that she’d done this to him.

Had she kissed Luca like this today? Had she enjoyed playing one cousin off against the other again? Had she paraded her son in front of Luca to hedge her bets in case Enrico did not come through with what she wanted from him?

Or did she really not know which one of them was Nicky’s father?

Well, he could tell her. He knew the answer without asking the question!

He pushed her from him, cursing the way his body was burning for more of her while the deep pit of his anger gushed like iced water through his blood.

‘What was that for?’ she choked, shoving a set of fingers up to cover her ravished lips.

‘I have to go away.’ He turned his back on her, stiff-shouldered, stiff-damn-everything! ‘I will not see you again until we meet at the church.’

‘So that was meant as a farewell kiss, was it?’

She sounded shaken and shocked and he wanted to swing round and strangle her—but he had his son to consider, and a marriage to get through to secure Nicolo’s place in his life.

‘Sorry to tell you this, Enrico, but your technique is slipping.’

‘Put it down to pre-wedding nerves,’ he heard himself respond with only a slight hint of sourness.

‘Just say the word and we can call it off.’

The offer pulled him up short just as he was about to leave. He really thought he could live this lie through until she was safely married to him—but he found he could not.

His control exploded and he turned on her, his expression savaged by anger and contempt. ‘I know about Luca!’ he ripped out harshly.

She stopped rubbing her bruised lips to look up at him. ‘You know what about Luca?’ she asked.

So wide-eyed and innocent, he thought cynically. And the hair—the damned hair! Loose and flowing and shining like silk around her perfect face!

The bitch, the bitch—he had to clench his fists together to stop himself from reaching for her long, white, satin-smooth throat. He wanted to hate her so badly that the need burned like acid in his blood.

But he did not hate her, he—

‘You met with him today in London,’ he enunciated over the hard rock of other words blocking his throat.

‘I did not!’ she denied.

‘And on at least one other occasion in the last two weeks.’

Freya was looking at him now as if he had gone mad. ‘I haven’t set eyes on your awful cousin since you kicked him out of your apartment three years ago, and nor do I ever want to,’ she insisted. ‘Where did you get the crazy idea that I have?’

‘I had him tracked down to a hotel close to here—’

‘Good for you.’ She mocked that. ‘What has it got to do with me?’

He made a tense, tight movement with his body that seemed to help him to pull in air through flaring nostrils.

‘A woman was seen going into his suite,’ he informed her. ‘She was a redhead.’

Freya stared at him open-mouthed. ‘And you’re assuming that the redhead was me?’