Rafaello's Mistress

‘Would you like to go for a drive in my Porsche?’ he murmured huskily.

Thrilled to death by that invitation, it could not be said that she played hard to get. ‘When?’

‘Now. Just follow me outside.’

And, just like that, she did. She had a little difficulty walking in a straight line across the car park.

‘Not the most loyal of girlfriends, are you?’ Rafaello remarked.

‘I only met him tonight,’ Glory hastened to inform him. ‘You recognised me, didn’t you?’

‘Oh, yes…you’re not easily missed.’

He unlocked the Porsche and settled her inside first with the kind of well-bred good manners that thrilled her. And while she was sitting there frantically trying to think of something witty to say, he drove her home.

‘What…why are you bringing me back here?’ Glory demanded, aghast at the sight of her parental home. ‘I’m supposed to be staying at my friend’s house tonight. I can’t go home dressed like this, not when I?

??ve been drinking either… I thought you were taking me for a drive!’

‘I just did—’

‘No, but I thought—’

‘You’re not capable of thinking anything right now. Your date was deliberately getting you drunk. You shouldn’t be drinking under age, particularly when you’re not mature enough for adult company—’

‘What are you talking about?’ Glory screeched at him in anguish.

‘You just walked out of that bar with me and got into my car. Don’t you realise how dangerous it is for a woman to behave like that? You don’t have the wit of a newborn baby. The safest place for you is home—’

‘My mother will kill me!’ she launched at him in complete panic.

‘I’ll have a word with her.’ Thrusting open the driver’s door, Rafaello cut short the dialogue.

Glory burst into floods of tears. He extracted her from his passenger seat only with difficulty. ‘I just couldn’t stand by watching that slimeball filling you up with booze,’ he breathed impatiently. ‘Surely you realise how he was planning to end the evening?’

‘You let me think that you—’

‘You’re out of bounds, Glory. You’re only sixteen.’

‘You were looking at me like you fancied me!’ she condemned tearfully.

‘Easiest way to get you out of there, and it wasn’t difficult…you’re a very beautiful girl—’

‘Do you think so?’ she asked him pathetically, and he laughed and her heart had gone crazy—but then her mother opened the front door.

Although Talitha Little had a hot temper, she had not said that much that night. The next morning over breakfast, while Glory was nursing a vicious hangover and being forced to explain herself, her mother had given her an odd little smile and had remarked that she was quite sure that Glory had learned her lesson well. Glory had spent the whole of that summer mulling over every word that Rafaello had said to her, and, appalled by the effect that alcohol had had on her usual caution, she had never touched it since then.

Emerging from those memories, Glory glanced at her watch and realised that she had already been upstairs for an hour. How could the same male who had protected her from her own juvenile stupidity be the same guy she was dealing with now? Was Benito Grazzini still with Rafaello? Glory crept out of the bedroom and crossed the landing to peer down into the hall. When the library door opened she backed away. She watched Rafaello and his father, a big barrel-chested man with silver hair, move to the front door together in silence. Benito Grazzini walked out and then abruptly turned to speak and to spread his hands in what looked curiously like an emotive appeal for understanding.

Glory was shocked by the expression on the older man’s face. He looked ravaged, almost distraught. But Rafaello’s profile was taut and grim. He made no response. After a moment Benito let his hands fall back to his sides in an attitude of weary defeat. Shoulders bowed, the older man turned and walked slowly and heavily out to the waiting limo gleaming beneath the outside lights. Rafaello thrust the door shut again.

‘Rafaello?’ Glory called down, for she could not silence herself. ‘What’s happened? What’s wrong?’

He froze in surprise and then threw back his dark head and looked up to where she stood at the head of the staircase. His lean, strong face was shuttered. ‘How long have you been up there?’

‘Only a minute. I saw your father leave. He seemed upset—’

Rafaello lifted a broad shoulder in a faint shrug of indifference, but he was unusually pale. His expressive mouth clenched hard and his dark eyes were cold. ‘Did he?’