Challenging Dante (A Bride for a Billionaire 4)

‘It happened naturally this time but you can understand why I won’t have her upset at the moment,’ he pointed out levelly. ‘It’s cards-on-the-table time, Topsy. If the draw at the castle is Dante Leonetti, you need to be aware of the kind of lifestyle he leads.’

‘Dante is not the draw and, yes, I do have a secret but it’s private and nothing to do with anyone else in the family, nor would it matter to them,’ Topsy proffered with conviction. ‘I’m almost twenty-four years old, Mikhail. Don’t expect me to explain everything I do.’

Her brother-in-law compressed his hard mouth. ‘I still remember you in your school uniform.’

‘And how many years ago is that?’ Topsy sighed. ‘I’m a big girl now.’

‘No, you’re physically tiny and still very naïve,’ Mikhail countered impatiently. ‘But don’t lay that at my door. Your sisters refuse to accept that baby has grown up.’

At that unexpected admission, which implied some understanding of her plight, Topsy relaxed a tiny bit. ‘I know. It’s ridiculous to get to my age and have to lie to lead my own life.’

Mikhail sat back into his chair. ‘Dante Leonetti?’ he queried with a raised brow. ‘How is he involved in this?’

‘He’s not. I don’t know why you’ve got a bee in your bonnet about him.’ But Topsy could feel her face burning, her eyes evading his direct look because she knew that she was insanely attracted to Dante.

‘He’s a player, Topsy. You couldn’t handle him,’ her brother-in-law told her in a tone of warning. ‘At one stage a couple of years ago he was famous in banking circles for keeping three mistresses. One in New York, one in Milan and one in Tokyo.’

Topsy was appalled. ‘Three? Seriously?’ she pressed, wide-eyed.

‘Seriously, he’s the equivalent of a suicide mission for a young woman from a sheltered background,’ Mikhail delivered.

‘Nothing’s going on, Mikhail,’ Topsy parried. ‘I have a summer job with Dante’s mother in a particularly beautiful part of the world. That’s virtually all there is to this.’

Dante had or had had three mistresses. That sleazy little fact rattled round and round in Topsy’s head throughout the drive back to the castle and left her feeling quite nauseous. What sort of a man went from one woman to another like that, treating them like interchangeable sexual utilities? And why did the X-rated imagery now assailing her overactive imagination actually wound and hurt? Why should it matter to her what he did in his bed? It wasn’t as though she were planning to have an affair with him. She couldn’t possibly be jealous of a man she barely knew. Yet neither could she doubt Mikhail’s veracity because Kat’s husband employed a highly trained investigative team. Through them, he had unparalleled access to background information about people he did business with and he was even more rigorous in checking out those who might offer a threat to members of his family.

* * *

While Topsy was lunching with Mikhail, Dante was entertaining an unexpected guest. Jerome St Charles, a member of the House of Lords and a widower, owned a house nearby where he often spent the summer with his adult children and their families. For a time, Dante had gone to school with Jerome’s son, James, and as neighbours of long standing the two families still occasionally socialised. Once, Dante had even cherished the vague hope that his mother might return Jerome’s obvious interest and admiration but nothing had come of it. Sad though it was in his view, his mother had remained impervious to male advances until Vittore came along.

‘I’m sorry to drop in on you without an invite. I would’ve phoned first but I didn’t know quite how to broach the subject,’ Jerome told him, a troubled look on his patrician face as he pushed an uneasy hand through his thick grey hair in a nervous gesture. ‘I’m afraid this is likely to be a rather embarrassing interview, but I’m fond of your mother and I felt I had to speak up and tell you what I know.’

Disconcerted as he was by that opening speech, Dante frowned at that reference to his parent and his light eyes narrowed with questioning intensity. ‘I’m afraid I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about, Jerome.’

‘It’s this...’ The older man settled a local newspaper down on the table beside the window.

Dante lifted it up and gazed down at a print photograph of his mother with Topsy standing in the background. The picture adorned an in-depth article about the charity to support women who had had miscarriages that his mother had started up about ten years earlier. ‘What’s wrong with it?’

‘That pretty brunette working for your mother—I’ve...er...met her before,’ Jerome divulged awkwardly. ‘In London. I spent an evening with her... I...er...paid for her time.’

His green eyes darkening and cooling by several degrees, Dante stared back at him in unconcealed disbelief. ‘Topsy? You paid for her time?’

Colour marking his cheekbones, the older man sighed. ‘It’s not quite as sordid as it sounds. She’s not—as far as I know—a prostitute, but when I spent time with her she was available for the right price as an escort. I took her out to dinner one evening. I enjoy young attractive female company now and again and very pleasant she was too,’ he acknowledged ruefully. ‘But what’s a girl like that doing working for your mother?’

‘Let me get this straight...’ Dante paused, his strong jaw line now set hard as granite, a tiny muscle tugging at the corner of his unsmiling mouth. ‘When you met Topsy Marshall, she was working as an escort? And you hired her?’

Jerome nodded. ‘We dined out. It was purely platonic. I had the pleasure of an attractive woman on my arm and she, of course, would’ve received a fee for her time.’

Dante gritted his even white teeth together, a combustible mix of anger and revulsion burning through him. Topsy was an escort; Topsy had worked as an escort! She had fooled him, he reflected rawly. Hadn’t he been falling for the vulnerable ditzy act she was putting on? He was not easily shocked but the news that she had worked as an escort did shock him. Nevertheless he had complete trust in the older man, whom he had known all his life. Even though Jerome was embarrassed to admit that he had hired an escort, his sense of honour and his concern for Dante’s mother had not allowed him to remain silent and Dante respected the sacrifice of dignity that the older man had made.

Jerome had barely departed before Dante received a call from his bodyguard telling him who Topsy had met up with in Florence. After what he had learned from Jerome he was just a little better prepared for that revelation. Mikhail Kusnirovich, the Russian oil oligarch, her ex-flame? Presumably, she was a former mistress, what else? Dante swallowed hard, knowing he no longer needed to wonder why she had been picked up by a limo or where her reputedly expensive diamond necklace had come from. Those expensive trappings told their own sleazy story. Such a dubious background did, however, make it seem highly unlikely that she had designs on Vittore, who had virtually no money of his own and no hope of any unless he got a divorce.

Had Topsy been summoned to the Russian’s hotel suite in Florence simply for sex? Dante, his heart pounding, his hands clenched into fists, green eyes ablaze, paced his study in an ever-deepening rage. What else would she have been doing in a hotel suite but laying herself down on a bed? Mikhail Kusnirovich had made a booty call and she had answered it without the smallest protest. It could not get much more basic than that.

Yet he recalled her dismay during that phone call, his original suspicion that she was alarmed. Certainly, Kusnirovich was a man few women would dare to reject, a man of unsavoury reputation. Che diavolo! Was he making excuses for her now? She was a whore; what else could she be from such a background as Jerome had given him? Jerome might not have taken advantage of the situation but other men assuredly would have expected, even demanded, something a good deal less innocent than her company. Under no circumstances should such a Jezebel be working for his mother!

* * *

In a reflective mood, T

opsy mounted the steps to the castle. Mikhail had not leant on her as heavily as she had feared, his mood doubtless softened by the delightful and surprising news that he was to become a father again without the necessity of Kat having to undergo another gruelling round of IVF treatment. Mikhail had also recognised that it was ridiculous for Topsy’s sisters to fuss over her every move as much as they did and hopefully his more realistic attitude would eventually persuade Kat that her constant worrying about her youngest sibling was unnecessary.

Topsy was heading for the imposing main staircase when a door opened.

‘I want a word with you in private,’ Dante murmured curtly from the doorway.

‘Maybe later. I have some stuff to do for your mother,’ Topsy replied, shooting a lingering glance in his direction. Three mistresses, she was thinking helplessly. The surfeit of sex he was enjoying should surely have prevented him from demonstrating any interest in her. Yet it had not. His face was taut, faint colour edging his exotic cheekbones, his extraordinary eyes unusually bright below his winged brows. So beautiful, she reflected before she could suppress and kill that dangerous thought.

‘Now,’ Dante ground out like a feudal king demanding subservience.

Her chin lifting, Topsy stood her ground. ‘But—’

‘Now!’ Dante thundered back at her in full volume.

Topsy was so taken aback by the shattering charge of anger he radiated that her feet automatically made the turn for her and she moved towards him, her smooth brow furrowed with concern. ‘What’s happened?’

CHAPTER FIVE