The Temporary Mrs. Marchetti
Isolated.
It was the same feeling he’d felt when Alice walked out on his proposal. He stood in the middle of that crowded restaurant feeling as if a wall of thick glass were separating him from everyone else. No one could reach him. He could not reach them. He was blocked. Imprisoned in a cage along with his frustrated hopes and shattered dreams.
‘We have unfinished business, Alice.’
‘No. We. Don’t.’ Her words came out like hard pellets. ‘Our business is finished. Kaput. Over. Dead and buried.’
Cristiano parked the car before he swivelled in his seat to look at her. She was sitting with her arms stiffly folded, her legs crossed, and her ankle jerking up and down as if she had a tic. ‘It’s not though, is it, cara? It’s not one little bit finished.’
Her eyes met his and her throat moved up and down over a swallow like a small creature moving under a rug. But then she lowered her gaze to a point just below the knot of his tie. He heard her take a breath that sounded more like a shudder than a breath. ‘You always did play dirty.’
‘I play to win,’ he said. ‘So do you. It’s why we clash so much.’
Her eyes came back to his. Hard. Bright. Flashing with such palpable rage he could feel it throbbing in the air that separated them. ‘I won’t let you win this, Cristiano. You might be able to blackmail me into marrying you, but you can’t make me fall in love with you. That’s what you want, isn’t it? You want me to fall in love with you and then throw it back in my face like I threw back yours.’
‘On the contrary, falling in love with me would be most inadvisable,’ Cristiano said. ‘Falling into bed with me? Well, that may be worth considering.’
Her eyes went as wide as the steering wheel he was resting his arm across. ‘But you said you don’t—’
‘A
man can change his mind, can’t he?’
Her mouth opened and shut a couple of times, two flags of pink riding high on her cheekbones. ‘I’m not going to sleep with you. I don’t care how much you blackmail me.’
‘Fine. Probably better that way.’ He opened his door and proceeded to get out. ‘I can get my needs met elsewhere.’
She sprang out of the car before he could get round to her side. ‘Oh, no, you don’t,’ she said, hands on hips. ‘You don’t get to cheat on me. No way. If you can have lovers then so can I.’
Cristiano slowly shook his head as if dealing with a small, wilfully disobedient child. ‘No. I’m the one who makes the rules. You follow them.’
She came at him with a pointed finger, drilling him in the chest like a tiny outraged jackhammer. ‘I’m not obeying any of your stupid rules. I’m going to do what I damn well like and you can’t stop me.’
Cristiano captured her hand, every cell in his body aching to tug her flush against him and show her what she was doing to him. But he was biding his time, waiting for her to come to him, as he knew in his bones she would. Her fiery nature stirred the banked-down embers of his. The heat was rising in a wildfire of lust, thundering through him like a runaway train on a steep decline.
He wanted her.
Oh, how he wanted her.
It was a thirst he couldn’t quench with anyone else. A hunger that refused to be satisfied with another’s touch. She was in his blood. In his body. She was a fever that had lain dormant until he had walked into her beauty salon and seen her sitting there with that coolly indifferent look on her face.
She wasn’t indifferent to him. Not one little bit. He could see it in her eyes, the way they kept darting to his mouth and the way her tongue swept over her lips as if recalling the taste and feel of his crushed to its softness.
Cristiano slid one hand up her warm, silky smooth thigh. ‘If we weren’t in a public place I would take you right here and now.’
She pushed back from him as if he had suddenly burst into scorching flames. ‘Get away from me.’
‘Careful, Alice,’ he said. ‘We’re in public. It’s time to behave yourself.’
Her eyes went to needle-thin slits, her body visibly quaking with fury. ‘Just you wait until I get you alone.’
He smiled and gave a mock shiver of delight. ‘I can hardly wait.’
* * *
Alice was so angry she could barely read the menu. A red mist was before her eyes at the way he had turned things around so deftly. So he did want to marry her. But why? What did he hope to achieve? A bunch of stupid old shares he probably didn’t need? She didn’t buy that for a second. He wanted to marry her to punish her. To humiliate her.
But the more she thought about the long-term benefits for the short-term pain, she realised she really didn’t have a choice. If she wanted to reach the pinnacle of success she had always dreamed of then this was the way to do it, and far quicker than she could ever have imagined.