Delucca's Marriage Contract

An efficient waiter arrived within seconds and poured them water. Keelin took a thirsty gulp and looked up to see Gianni sitting back, staring at her. Immediately she felt dishevelled, self-conscious. ‘What? Am I sweaty?’

He shook his head. ‘You have no idea how beautiful you are, do you?’ He leant forward. ‘It’s a rare woman who can go out without any make-up and yet put all the other women around her to shame.’

Keelin flushed. ‘You don’t need to say that—’

‘I do,’ he said simply. ‘You’re stunning.’

She was completely unused to getting compliments. Her mother had always despaired that Keelin was a redhead like her and had fought a constant battle to become blonder and blonder herself. She’d spent ridiculous amounts of money on hiding her natural Celtic freckles, and would tell Keelin ad nauseum about men who hated that au natural look she favoured.

She fiddled with her glass. ‘Well, thank you.’ She snuck Gianni a glance and said with a wry twitch of her mouth, ‘You’re not exactly ugly yourself.’

He put a hand to his chest in mock incredulity. ‘I think that’s the first nice thing you’ve ever said to me.’

Keelin dipped her fingers in her water and flicked it at him, her mouth twitching in earnest now. ‘As if you need to be told.’

He leant forward again and said mock conspiratorially, ‘All men are craving reassurance underneath their confident exteriors.’

The waiter reappeared with two glasses of white wine. He lifted his glass. ‘What shall we toast to?’

Keelin’s chest felt tight. What shall we toast to indeed? She lifted hers. ‘The present moment.’

Those black eyes glittered, almost as if he could see into her head and know what the thought process had been behind her return to the villa earlier. He tipped his glass towards her. ‘To us, Keelin.’

She took a quick sip. Her skin felt sensitive and whenever he looked at her she was acutely aware of herself. While they’d been looking around the town he’d taken every opportunity to touch her in small ways—taking her hand, touching her back, protecting her if a crowd of tourists jostled them.

She pushed aside the suspicion that Gianni was merely going all out to do his best to seduce her into becoming the malleable wife he wanted. The cool wine slid like sweet tart nectar down her throat, imbuing her with a sense of deep relaxation, complicit in this indulgence.

And with the same skill he’d exhibited earlier, Gianni drew her into a light conversation. The fact that it managed to reinforce how much they seemed to have in common chipped away at yet more of Keelin’s badly dented defences.

He sat back at one stage, a definite gleam of triumph in his eyes. ‘You said it yourself, we’re really not that different after all.’

Keelin wanted to scowl at his recall, but found it hard. She was too replete with the most delicious dinner she’d ever had: fileto al sagrantino—meat cooked in a local wine sauce—washed down with a full-bodied red wine. And the most gorgeous man on the planet right across from her.

Lust was winding a delicious tension tighter and tighter inside her. She hoped that Gianni couldn’t see the neediness he evoked in her.

Thankfully the waiter interrupted them, taking away plates, asking about dessert. Keelin shook her head. ‘I’m too full.’

Gianni ordered coffees and Keelin wanted to shift his focus off her.

‘Why did you decide to buy a home here?’

He looked at her. ‘It was through my grandfather. When he moved to Rome originally he used to come here to learn more about foods and wines, and then he brought me with him, educating me. Along with the summers in Sicily they were magical trips. He was a good teacher.’

His mouth tightened. ‘His own son wasn’t interested in what he loved most, but I was. I lapped it up.’

Keelin felt that empathy again. ‘And then had to watch as your father threw it all away. That must have been hard.’

Gianni shrugged, expression veiled now. ‘I’m just sorry Nonno’s not here to see the fruits of his labour taking off again.’

‘When did he die?’

‘When I was eleven.’

An impressionable age. The same age as Keelin had been when she’d realised she’d have no

role to play in her own family business. She said huskily, ‘He’d be proud, I’m sure.’

The coffees arrived and Keelin took a quick sip, needing to dilute some of this dreamy effect she was feeling.