The Italian's Future Bride

Not that Rachel could tell. His attention was too firmly fixed on his new dining partner. And she was not the only one to notice the change in place settings, or the difference in him. Others kept sending her brief telling glances, then looking down the table at him.

Raffaelle did not notice. He was too busy plying his beautiful companion with wine and food, while Rachel could barely bring herself to swallow a thing. And, to top this whole disaster of an evening, having her handsome fiancé sitting beside her was enough protection to give Daniella’s tongue back its sharpened edge.

‘How is Elise?’ she began innocently enough.

‘Fine,’ Rachel responded. ‘She’s still in Chicago with her husband and son.’

‘And your…half-brother? The one with the camera? Is he still enjoying playing tricks on the rich and famous?’

How Daniella had managed to discover that Mark was her half-brother Rachel just did not feel like finding out right now. ‘Mark is fine,’ she answered in the same level tone and tried to change the subject. ‘How are your wedding plans coming along?’

‘Wonderful.’ Daniella smiled happily. ‘I’m here in Milan for my dress-fitting. Isn’t that dress you’re wearing—?’ She named a top designer. ‘Did Raffaelle buy it for you? How much do you think you have stung him for by now?’

‘My dress is not by that particular designer,’ Rachel answered quietly, ‘and I pay for my own clothes.’

‘Well, don’t bother buying anything expensive for my wedding, darling, because by the look of it you will not be coming.’ Daniella flicked her eyes down the table. ‘Knowing Raffaelle as well as I do, I think I can positively predict that you are on your way out and Francesca is definitely on her way back in.’

One short glance down the table was enough for Rachel to confirm why Daniella felt so very sure about that. If it wasn’t enough that he had ignored her all evening, the way he was smiling that oh-so-familiar lazily sensual smile at the beautiful Francesca was the final straw for her.

‘You know what, Daniella?’ She turned back to her tormentor. ‘Watching you marry that poor fool sitting next to you is the last thing on earth that I want to do.’ The poor fool heard what she said and turned sharply to look at her. She ignored him. ‘So dance on my grave, if that’s what turns you on,darling ,’ she invited. ‘And, while you’re doing it, tell your stepbrother from me that he can have his Francesca with my absolute blessing!’

Then she stood up. The nausea instantly hit her again. She pushed her chair back and walked away. Silence had fallen around the table. How many of them had heard her exit line she did not know and she did not care.

Raffaelle tuned in too late to catch anything but the sight of Rachel’s taut back retreating and the uncomfortable silence that followed. Gino was frowning angrily at Daniella. His stepsister had gone very pale. Someone else muttered a soft, ‘Dio.’

And the whole table watched as he came to his feet. Someone touched his hand. It might have been Francesca. He neither knew nor cared.

He strode after Rachel. ‘Where the hell do you think you are going?’ he raked out, catching hold of her wrist to bring her to a standstill between two tables.

It came out of nowhere, the rise in anger, the sudden swing round. Next thing she knew, she had slapped him full in the face.

A camera flashed.

His eyes lit up bright silver. ‘That’s tomorrow’s trash out of the way,’ he gritted, then hauled her up against him and kissed her hard.

The flashes kept on coming. The whole restaurant had fallen into complete silence to witness Raffaelle Villani fight with his future bride. By the time he set her mouth free her lips were burning and her heart was thumping and tears were hot in her eyes.

‘I wish I’d never met you,’ she hissed up at him, then wrenched free of him and walked away.

Outside the air was cool and she shivered. Dino stood leaning against the car in the car park but he straightened the moment he saw Raffaelle appear.

‘Rachel—’

‘Stay away from me.’ She started walking away from both the driver and Raffaelle, her spindly heels clicking on the hard pathway’s surface. Inside she was a mass of muddled feelings, nausea and the pumping, pounding need to just get right away from everything.

She managed about ten metres before the car drew up beside her, at the same time as a figure leapt out of it and a hard hand arrived around her waist.

She tried to pull free; the hand tightened. ‘You know how this works,’ Raffaelle said grimly. ‘You decide which way we do it.’

&

nbsp; A camera flashed. They both blinked as it happened. Raffaelle muttered something nasty as his free hand pulled open the car door. Shivering, Rachel stiffened away from him and entered the car under her own steam.

The door closed her in. He walked round the car to get in beside her. With no glass partition in here to give them privacy, they were forced to hold their tongues, so the silence pulsed like a third heartbeat between them.

Anger, hostility, a tight sizzlinghatred that ran dangerously close to its unrequited flipside flicked at the muscles in Raffaelle’s face and held Rachel’s frozen in her own private hell.

If he had not drunk so much wine, keeping up with Francesca in his attempt to divert her curious attention away from Rachel, Raffaelle knew he would have kicked Dino out of the car and taken his place, just to give himself something to do and stop himself from wanting to reach out and kill her for making him feel like this.