‘If you marry me then, as your husband, it will be my duty to help you and your family.’

‘It’s not that—’ Put like that, it brought home to Alyse all the more the reason why she should feel this whole deal was just too good to be true. ‘It’s—what will you get out of this?’

Something changed in his blue eyes, as if a wash of dark water was flooding over them, but then, to her astonishment, they cleared again. Dario smiled down into her concerned face, and as he did so he held out his hand to her, palm upwards, as he had done when he had brought back the pearl earring to her the day before. Dazedly she put her own hand into his and felt herself being drawn up to her feet, to stand close to him.

‘Do you really have to ask?’

KATE WALKER was born in Nottingham, UK, but grew up in West Yorkshire. She met her husband at university in Wales and originally worked as a children’s librarian. After the birth of her son she returned to her old childhood love of writing. Her first book was published in 1984. She now lives in Lincolnshire with her husband (also a writer), and two cats who think they rule her life.

Olivero’s Outrageous Proposal

Kate Walker

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my dear friend Pat

1949–2014

Good friends are like stars…

You don’t always see them,

but you know they are always there.

Contents

Cover

Introduction

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

ALYSE HAD ALMOST given up on her plan, and was on the verge of deciding that the whole thing was a crazy, downright dangerous idea, when she saw him. She was actually thinking about leaving before this dazzling charity ball had really got started, suffering second and even third thoughts about the wild scheme she had come up with when the crowd before her parted slightly, forming a pathway that led straight from her to the tall, dark male on the opposite side of the room.

Her breath caught, and she knew that her eyes had widened even as she pushed back a fall of golden-blonde hair so as to see him better. He was...

‘Perfect...’

The word slipped past her lips, escaping her control and actually whispering into the overheated air.

The man on the far side of the room looked so different, alien almost. He stood out as vividly as a big black eagle in the middle of a bunch of glorious, sparkling peacocks. Of the same species but somehow totally unlike everyone else.

And that difference was what caught her eyes and held them, finding it impossible to look away. She even froze with her champagne flute halfway to her lips, unable to complete the movement.

He was stunning. There was no other word for it. Tall and strong with a lean, powerful physique encased in the sleek sophistication of formal clothes in a way that somehow made him look dangerously untamed in contrast to the elegant silk suit, the pristine white of his shirt. His tie had been tugged loose at some point by impatient, restless hands, and it now dangled limply around his throat where the top button of his shirt had been wrenched open too, as if he needed space to breathe. The fall of his black hair was worn longer than any other man’s there, like the mane of a powerful lion. High slashing cheekbones were etched above the lean stretch of his cheeks, long dark lashes concealing the burn of his eyes as he stared out across the room, the faint smile on his sensual mouth one of cold derision rather than any real sign of warmth.

And it was that that made him perfect. The faint but obvious sign that, like her, he didn’t quite belong here. Of course, she doubted that he’d been pushed out into the public world as she had. Her father had insisted that she come here tonight, when she’d much rather have stayed at home.

‘You need to get out after spending your days stuck in that poky little art gallery,’ he’d said.

‘I like my days in the gallery!’ Alyse had protested. It might not be the job in fine art she’d hoped for, but she earned her own money and, if nothing else, it gave her a break from the stresses at home when the demands of her mother’s illness seemed to throw a black cloud over everything.

‘But you’ll never meet anyone unless you socialise more.’

For ‘anyone’ read Marcus Kavanaugh, Alyse thought wryly. The man who had made her life hell recently with his unwanted attentions, his persistent visits and determination to persuade her to marry him. He’d even started turning up at the ‘poky little’ art gallery so that she had no peace from him. Then just recently, for some reason, Alyse’s father seemed to have decided that the marriage would be a match made in heaven.

‘He might be your boss’s son and heir, but he’s just not my type!’ she’d protested, but it was obvious that her father wasn’t listening. He wasn’t actually pressing her to accept Marcus’s proposal but, all the same, it was plain that he thought it was unlikely that she’d do better with anyone else.

In the end, exhausted by feeling harassed and oppressed, she’d resolved to come to the ball tonight and use the event as a way to break out of the predicament in which she found herself. Which was where the stranger across the room came in.

Of course, this man obviously wasn’t slightly out of his depth like her. His height, stature and the fine cut of his clothes were the match of anyone here, and his expression showed that he wouldn’t give a damn what anyone thought of him. Which gave him an added advantage as the necessary partner in what she had hoped for tonight.

Her partner in crime, as it were.

It was as that thought crossed her mind that it seemed it had reached out and touched the man opposite. Because he stirred as if something had alerted him. That leonine head swung round, and his eyes clashed with hers.

It seemed that in the moment her eyes met his the world suddenly tilted, lurching dizzily, so that she actually reached out a hand to press against the wall beside her and keep herself upright.

Danger.

The word seemed to flash wildly inside her head, making her bite her lip in a sort of a panic, but one that was mixed with excitement too. She’d wanted a way to put an end to Marcus’s over-persistent pursuit; it would be great if she could have a little fun as she did so. If fun was the way to describe the fizz this man put into her body.

She’d started slightly in that moment of fierce contact, jerking her glass so that drops of the pale sparkling liquid splashed out of it, landing on the rich blue silk of her dress and marking it with damp, spreading patches.

‘Oh, no!’

She had a tissue in her tiny silver clutch, but reaching for it with one hand while trying to balance the glass with the other only made things so much worse. The delicate stem of her glass flute was clutched between her fingers, the bag almost tumbling to the floor. Her desperate grab to stop it escaping made it slip dangerously in her grasp, slopping more wine onto the tops of her breasts exposed by the scooped neckline of her dress.

‘Allow me.’

It was a cool voice, calm and smooth as silk, powerfully soothing. Alyse had barely enough time to recognise that it was deep, masculine and beautifully accented before a pair of hands—long, strong, bronze-skinned—reached out and took the vulnerable glass, the silver clutch from her, depositing them on a nearby table. Then he snagged up an immaculate white napkin and shook it loose before pressing it against her waist, padding at the spill that stained her dress.

‘Th-thank you.’

The foolish weakness in her legs was still afflicting her, so she fought for the control she needed. But, in spite of her efforts, she still swayed awkwardly on the ridiculously high heels she was unused to wearing.

‘Steady.’

That voice was closer, almost in her ear. Or perhaps that had something to do with the way he had stopped mopping her dry and now that powerful hand had closed around her own, holding her upright.

‘Thank you.’

To her relief, her voice was stronger now, firmer, and she felt her balance return. She could stand upright at last, bring her head up, look him in the eye...

And almost lost all that hard-won stability when she looked up into the bluest eyes she had ever seen, deep and clear and bright as a Mediterranean ocean in the sun at the height of the day.

The man who had been on the opposite side of the room now stood at her side, big and dark and disturbing. His tall frame blocked out the light, the sight of everyone else in the ballroom. The heat of his body seemed to reach out to enclose her, and the scent of his skin, mixed with some tangy cologne, was like a warm enchantment all around her so that inhaling it made her head spin in sensuous intoxication.

‘You.’

This time she had enough thought left to twist her hand from under his and grab at the strong arm that was near to her. She felt the hardness of bone, the power of muscles bunch and tighten under the silk suit and knew a rush of heat and flame that seared along her nerves, threatening to melt her strength away in the same moment that she rediscovered it.

‘Me...’ he confirmed, the uneven smile that accompanied the single word strangely ambiguous.

He took the napkin from the hand that still held hers, freeing it for use again.

‘Better get this dried off fast,’ he murmured, ‘before it ruins your dress completely.’

‘I—yes...’

What else was there to say? And who else to say it to? It seemed that they existed in a private, closed off bubble, a world of their own while the buzz of conversation went on around her unabated.

That proud dark head was bent, the brush of his waving hair soft against her cheek as he concentrated on the task of cleaning up the mess of wine. He was so close that she felt he must hear the unexpected thunder of her heart, see the way her breathing had sped up, bringing a rush of colour to her skin. That napkin was now moving over the edge of her neckline, crossing the point where blue silk met creamy flushed skin, stroking over the sheen of wine on the tops of her breasts.

It was soft, delicate almost, but in the same second it felt like an invasion, far too intimate for the moment and their surroundings. Too intimate from him.

‘I think that will do...’

She wanted to spin away, knocking his hands aside, so shaken by the effect his touch was having on her even through the folds of that starched linen napkin. But at the same time she wanted more of it. More of that touch and closer, nearer to skin.

So she pushed the response from her mouth, afraid that if she wasn’t careful she would replace the words with others. Ones that her primitive female instincts wanted her to throw at him, the words more and please hovering dangerously close to her tongue.

‘I’m fine now—thank you.’

‘Yes, I think you are.’

He was still so close that his warm breath stirred the blonde tendrils of her hair where they curled over her ear. But at least his hand had stopped that slow, caressing movement, and he had lifted it from her skin, bundling the napkin into a ball before dropping it back on to the table beside them.

‘So perhaps now we can start again.’

The beautifully accented voice had a smile in it, one that was echoed in the curve of his lips. But those deep blue eyes had a cooler, assessing expression in them that made her feel uncomfortably like some specimen laid out on a microscope slide.

‘Or, rather, start.’

He straightened up fully and it was only then that she realised just how tall he was, the way he had bent to his task disguising the long, lean frame that was approaching three inches taller than hers, even in the four-inch heels.

‘My name is Dario Olivero,’ he said, holding out a hand in a formal greeting that seemed ridiculous after that enclosed moment of heightened intimacy they had just shared. His voice sounded strangely rough, as if he was speaking from a dry throat.

‘Alyse Gregory...’

She followed his lead, her voice almost failing her as she slicked her tongue over suddenly parched lips in an attempt to moisten them, and watched his intent blue gaze drop to watch the betraying movement. She could have sworn that the corners of that beautifully shaped mouth curled up slightly in response and it seemed to her that it was the sort of smile that might appear on the face of a tiger when it realised that the deer it had its sights on was tremblingly aware of its presence.

But even that thought fled from her mind when he took her hand in his and held it, strong and warm and shockingly exciting. It was as if no one had ever held her hand before. At least not with this sizzling burn of contact, the shockwaves of heat that seemed to spread out from every tiny point of contact, burning along her nerves straight to the most feminine centre of her body. The sensations, the thoughts this created felt positively licentious, indecent in such a public place and with someone she had only just met.

They were also the sort of sensations she had never felt before. Never this fast, this strong, for a man who was almost a complete stranger.

But at least now she knew his name. And she’d heard of Dario Olivero of course. Who hadn’t? His vineyards and the superb award-winning wines they created were known the world over.

‘Alyse...’ he said, and his tone made her name into a very new and very sensual sound, curling the two syllables around his tongue and making them seem almost like a caress. But the look in his eyes still seemed to contradict the soothing sound. The clear dark blue had sharpened, focused strangely just for a moment, then his face relaxed again and he turned on a brief blinding smile.

* * *

Alyse Gregory. The name echoed round inside Dario’s head. So this was Lady Alyse Gregory. He had been told that she was to be at the ball—it was the only reason he had endured the boredom of the evening so far, though it had amused him to watch the other guests, see their false smiles, the air kisses that made no contact, meant nothing at all.

Way back, he would not even have been able to cross the threshold here, let alone mix with this titled and moneyed crowd. If he’d tried, he had no doubt that he would have been shown the door. The back door. A door he’d had plenty of experience of when he’d been in charge of deliveries for the Coretti winery, the place that had given him his first job and set him on the road to success.

Perhaps once he might have been given entry as Henry Kavanaugh’s bastard son, if his father had ever acknowledged him. Just the thought brought a sour taste into his mouth. If he had ever hoped for that then tonight the hope was completely erased from his mind. Tonight he was here, accepted, welcomed as himself. As Dario Olivero, owner of the hugely successful vineyards in Tuscany, exporter of the wines that the wealthy and powerful fought to have on their tables at events like this...

A man who had made his own fortune. And of course money talked.

But that wasn’t what had brought him here tonight. Instead he’d wanted to meet one woman—this woman.

‘Hello, Alyse Gregory.’ It took an effort to iron out the note in his voice that revealed the blend of satisfaction and surprise that flooded through him.

He’d expected her to be beautiful. Marcus certainly wouldn’t be seen at a huge social event like this with anyone who was less than supermodel material, even if she did have the title that both the Kavanaughs, father and son—legitimate son—believed to be so important.

But this Alyse Gregory was nothing like Marcus’s usual run of women. She was tall, blonde, beautiful—that much was true. But there was also something different about her. Something unexpected.

She was far less artificial than the sort of painted sticks Marcus liked to be photographed with. She had curves too—real curves, not the silicone-enhanced bosoms flaunted by Marcus’s last but one model of the year. Those moments spent mopping the wine from the creamy skin exposed by her neckline had set his pulse thundering, his trousers feeling uncomfortably tight. The scent of her body, blended with a richly floral perfume, had risen from her skin to enclose him in a scented cloud that made his senses spin. And the moment that a small, glistening drop had slid down into the shadowed valley between her breasts had dried his mouth to parchment so that he had had to swallow hard before he could give her his name.

He was on the verge of making a complete fool of himself, holding on to her fine, long-boned hand for so long. The smile that had come to her lips was wavering, and he could feel the tension in her fingers as if they were hovering on the edge of being snatched away.

‘Forgive me...’

‘Hello, Dario...’

The two sentences clashed in mid-air between them, and the sudden release of tension made them laugh, even if a little edgily. When he released her hand he was surprised to see that she still held it up just for a moment, suspended between them, not quite breaking the contact. But a second later she had dropped it to her side again, looking round for the bag he had placed on the table moments before.

‘Thank you for coming to my aid.’

‘I was coming towards you before that.’ He couldn’t hold back the truth.

‘You were?’ Her blonde head went back slightly, green eyes looking up into his face, a small, puzzled frown creasing the smoothness of her brow.

‘But of course...’

The smile he gave her now was much more natural, so that he could feel the spark of awareness in her before her own lips curved in response.

‘And you knew it.’

‘Did I?’

She was going to back away from it; the sharpness of the question told him that. That, and the sudden lift of her chin in defiance, the firming of that full, sensual mouth. She was going to deny that stunning, fiery spark of awareness that had flashed across the width of the huge room in the moment that their eyes had met. An awareness that had pushed him into action, moving towards her before he had even recognised what was happening or stopped to think, in a way that was totally out of character. He was not the sort of man who acted on impulse; he never made a rash move. Everything was thought out, the last detail finalised—‘i’s dotted, ‘t’s crossed. He was known for it. It was what he’d built his reputation—and his fortune—on: that total focus, the white-hot attention to detail.

And yet here he was, standing before a woman he had seen from across the room, simply because he had been unable to do anything else.

He didn’t even have the excuse that she was the woman he’d come here looking for. When he’d taken those first steps to her side he’d had no idea that she was Alyse Gregory.

That feeling had been in her too. He had seen it in her face, in the way she had choked on her wine as she’d tried to swallow it. He had been so totally sure...

‘Did I?’ she challenged again.

Those green eyes dropped from his, glancing swiftly to her right, to the huge archway where, even this late in the evening, a steady stream of new arrivals were making their way into the overcrowded ballroom. She must be looking for a way of escape, and irritation at the thought that her cowardice would make her deny the truth started to prickle over his skin.

But then, unexpectedly, she paused, turned back, lifted her head again.

‘Yes, I did,’ she said, strong and firm and almost bold. ‘And if you hadn’t, then I would certainly have come to you.’

It was such a turnaround that he felt almost as if the world tilted on its axis and something happened so that the woman he had first seen had disappeared and been replaced by another one. Identical in appearance but so very, very different.

‘So come on then,’ she teased, a new light in her eyes. ‘What were you heading towards me for?’

Good question. And one that he was damned if he could answer, with his brain suddenly turned to mud, while the more basic response of his body threatened to scramble his thoughts.

It was just his damned luck that the Alyse Gregory he had come here looking for was the sex kitten who had looked at him across a crowded room, their eyes connecting in an instant lightning strike, calling to him wordlessly with a come-hither glance. And now that he was here...

At that moment, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a movement on the stairs, a sleek blond head he recognised instantly. Marcus had finally made his appearance. Reminding him that the whole point of this had been to make sure that Marcus’s scheme to present his father with a titled daughter-in-law came off the rails before the night was over. Time to go back to plan A. Though, if he was lucky, he could put the new plan B into action at the same time.

‘I wanted to ask you to dance.’

Now, which woman would answer him? Which Alyse Gregory would give him a response—and in what sort of mood?

‘Of course.’

It was another Alyse entirely—a brand new one and one that was totally disconcerting. That smile would have lit up rooms, rivalling the huge glittering chandeliers in the high ceilings of the ballroom. And yet there was something odd about it, something that did not quite ring true. It was too bright, too blinding.

Too much.

But if that was what she was going to offer then he was going to take it. It fitted with what he had planned. Hell, it fitted with what he wanted, and he was having a hard time remembering what he’d planned when what he wanted was beating at the inside of his head like a pounding headache.

‘I’d love to dance.’

She held her hand up towards him, and what could he do but take it? They turned towards the dance floor, made their way into an open space. They had just a few moments of the light-hearted waltz that was being played. Enough time to take up the correct position, his arm at her waist, and, as soon as they had, the dance came to a halt, the music stopped.

‘Well...’

Alyse laughed, slanting an amused glance at their still linked hands, the careful positioning of their arms. But she didn’t make any move to turn away, to break his hold. Instead she stayed where she was, eyes the bright green of purest emeralds as she looked up into his face.

‘I still want to dance...’

Dario didn’t give a damn about the dancing. But if it meant that she stayed here like this, hands touching, close to him, so that he could see the rise and fall of her breasts as she breathed, watch the colour come and go in her cheeks, inhale the warm soft scent of her body as it came up to him with his head bent down towards hers, then he wasn’t going to be the first to break away. So he stayed where he was and waited.

Luckily the next dance was another waltz and, after a couple of seconds counting the beat, Alyse launched into the steps, swaying sensuously, taking him with her. She was incredibly light-footed, barely seeming to touch the floor as she drifted over it.

* * *

I still want to dance...

Her own words echoed inside Alyse’s head, but she hardly recognised them for what they were. In that moment she had felt as if her mind was suddenly assailed by a multitude of sensations, buzzing and fizzing through her thoughts.

She hadn’t just wanted to dance. She had been overwhelmed by an uncontrollable hunger to dance with this man. To feel his hand in hers, his arms around her. And it had nothing to do with the idea that had been in her mind when she had first seen him. The wild plan to find someone who would help her put Marcus off. Who would—hopefully—stop his intent pursuit of her when nothing else had worked.

But this had nothing to do with that. It had only and everything to do with Dario Olivero and the man he was. The man who had knocked her off balance from the moment she had first seen him and from then it felt as if her mind was not her own.

‘Dario...’ She tried out his name, feeling it as strange on her tongue, catching on her lips. But it was swallowed up in the melody they were dancing to. ‘Dario...’ she tried again, louder this time.

The dark head bent, blue eyes connecting with hers, searing off a protective layer of skin so that she felt everything—every touch, every movement, the warmth of his breath as it stirred her hair with a new and shocking intensity. She didn’t know how she moved her feet, only managing to keep to the steps of the dance by pure instinct as her gaze locked with his.

‘You dance very well...’ she managed, a tumble of words over a tongue that was thickened with tension and awareness. ‘More than well,’ she added and felt rather than heard the rumble of laughter in his chest so close to her ear.

‘It’s a bit late to realise that,’ he teased softly. ‘What if I had two left feet and trampled you underfoot from the moment we started?’

I wouldn’t have minded. She had to clamp her lips shut fast to stop the words escaping from her unguarded mouth. She didn’t feel as if her feet belonged to her anyway. She could almost have been hovering six inches above the floor, her steps so light and beyond her control.

‘Then relax.’

‘I am relaxed.’

He didn’t respond—at least not verbally but the slow lifting of one dark brow to question her comment made her heart kick in stunned reaction. Her mind might be whirling in sensation, but her body was holding itself straight and upright as she had been taught in the dance classes her mother had insisted on at the exclusive school she’d attended. The distance between their bodies was tiny—barely there.

But then she looked up into those stunning blue eyes and her heart skipped a beat. There was so much less of that blue there now, the enlarged black of his pupils swallowing up all the colour until his gaze was like a lake of black glass in which she could see herself reflected, small and so very vulnerable. She lost time for a moment, and almost stumbled. She might have tripped if it hadn’t been for the strength of the arms supporting her, the width and power of the broad shoulder under her hand.

But it wasn’t vulnerability that made her heart kick so hard under the blue silk of her dress that she had to catch her breath on a hasty gasp. It was a realisation that made her head spin, her pulse race.

He felt it too.

She could hardly believe it but there could be little doubt it was true. Dario Olivero, the dark, dangerous-looking pirate who just minutes before had been a total stranger, was now in the grip of the same heated response that was burning her up like a bush fire. He was as aroused as she was, and she was close to swooning with need, weakened by the sort of sensual hunger that she had never known before.

‘Dario...’

This time his name was just a croak, the dryness of her mouth, her throat making it almost impossible to speak. But he caught it and a strange flicker of a smile curled the corners of his sensual mouth before he bent his head again and let his cheek rest against the side of her head, his lips brushing her hair as he whispered one word again.

‘Relax...’

Gently but irresistibly he drew her towards him, the pressure of one powerful hand tight against her back, the heat of his palm burning the exposed skin over her spine.

‘Relax...’ he repeated, the softly accented voice entrancing her.

She melted against him, her body curving against his, loose and pliant. Her head was against his chest so that she could hear the heavy, strong beat of his heart under her ear. The scent of him enclosed her, the sway of her body matching his, and she gave herself up to sensation, to an awareness and sensitivity that swept aside the possibility of any other feeling. The heavy pressure of his arousal against her stomach awoke an answering hunger deep inside, an ache of need that was both pleasure and a yearning that demanded to be assuaged.

But not yet. Not until she had enjoyed this sensation of closeness, this connection for a while longer, and taken from it all she could get.

* * *

He had a nerve, Dario told himself, telling her to relax, when all the time his whole body felt as if it was in the grip of a raging fever that threatened to burn him up, reducing any chance of control into a pile of ashes blowing round his head. The fact that she had obeyed him only added to the tautness of every nerve that stung with tension every time she moved.

The whisper of her soft soles on the floor, the swirl of the bright blue dress around her slender legs all worked on his senses with hypnotic effect. Every sense, every part of him, his whole concentration was on the woman he held in his arms—the feel of her, the scent, the touch of her against his hands, skin against skin. But it was not enough. He wanted more and yet he was not prepared to stop this, to have it end. Not yet, even if it was to move on to something more viscerally satisfying. Something that every cell in his body was starting to demand with hungry determination.

This wasn’t what he had planned on, what he had expected to happen. But right now he was more than prepared to let it go its own way. Any thought of thwarting Marcus’s plans had been relegated to the hazy part of his mind. He would let this play out as it was for now...

He drew in a sharp, controlling breath just as one song came to an end and the band began another one. A slow dance. The sort of dance that encouraged a man to take a woman in his arms and hold her close.

So had he made the move or had Alyse stepped closer, moving into his arms without hesitation? She was so close, curved against him, the arch of her body pressed against his at breast and waist and hip so that it was impossible that she couldn’t feel the heat and hardness of the hunger he was unable to disguise. She must feel it and yet she showed no sign at all of objecting. If anything, she slid a little closer, making him curse silently at the pleasure that was so close to pain that burned through him as a result.

‘Alyse...’

It was just a groan, a note of warning. A public gathering, an elegant ballroom, was not the place for a response like this—so hard, so hot, so strong. This was a sensation that belonged in the bedroom, with his clothes flung wildly aside, the blue silk ripped from her body. It was all he could do to rein his raging senses in, hold himself upright...

‘Oh, hell...’

It was impossible. Couldn’t be done.

With an acknowledgement of defeat, he dropped his head down low, brushing his lips against the golden silk of her hair, feeling the delicate strands slide under his mouth. She murmured something softly and moved just a little closer, angling her head against the support of his chest so that the fine skin of her cheek, her neck, were exposed, offered to him for the kiss, the caress he knew he could not hold back from taking.

The taste of her flesh was like a drug, intoxicating, seducing him. He couldn’t wait any longer.

‘Alyse...’ His voice was rough and thickened with passion against the delicate curve of her ear. ‘I want... Let’s...’

‘Let’s go somewhere else.’ Her voice blended with his, the words exactly the same. The same note of hungry need blurring the sound so that they swirled and spun inside his head. ‘Somewhere more private.’

When she disengaged herself from his grasp and her hand slid into his, curving soft and warm around his fingers, Dario had no idea whether he was the one who took them from the dance floor or if in fact it was Alyse who led the way.

He only knew that this had been inevitable from the moment their eyes had first met. It was written into their fates, and no one and nothing was going to stop this now.

CHAPTER TWO

THE HALL BEYOND the ballroom was silent, strangely unoccupied after the crowds that had packed the other room. A buffet supper was being served as part of the event, and many people were already queuing there, waiting to be served. As a result, the almost empty hallway seemed unexpectedly cold and uncomfortable, making Alyse shiver in shock at the sudden change of temperature.

‘I need my coat...’

She fumbled in her clutch bag, looking for the cloakroom ticket. She had just found it when Dario reached over and took the slip of paper from her hand with a sharp tug.

‘Wait here.’

A gesture of courtesy—or taking control? Alyse couldn’t help wondering as she watched him stride across the marble floor to where the cloakroom attendant stood on duty. She didn’t know and she didn’t want to stop and consider the question. Control was a word she associated with her father—or with the sort of behaviour Marcus had been trying to force onto her—and she didn’t want to think of either of them right now.

Just two minutes out of the ballroom—two minutes away from the warm and intimate closeness of their dance—and already the heat and sensation had started to evaporate, leaving her with an uncomfortable shivery feeling inside. She wrapped her arms around herself in a vain attempt to bring some warmth back to uncomfortably chilled skin.

She hadn’t wanted to move apart from him; hadn’t wanted to break out of that cocoon that had formed around them. From the moment they had moved, Dario turning away from her, a cold, creeping sense of reality had started to invade the little bubble of delight she had been living in.

‘What am I doing?’

She actually muttered the words out loud as she kept her eyes fixed on the back of Dario’s dark head, the width of his powerful shoulders.

Was she really planning on heading out of here with him? With a man she had only met...her eyes slid to a clock above the cloakroom door...less than an hour before.

The main door opened with a heavy swish, someone who had gone outside for a sneaky cigarette coming in and leaving it partially open. Alyse balanced on her toes like an athlete readying for the gun to sound the starting point. She could go now...

But even as she took a step forward she caught the wave of cold and damp that came into the hall from behind the new arrival. His jacket was splashed with water too, warning of a change in weather outside. She would need her coat...and her coat...

Was in Dario’s hands, the fine black velvet looking impossibly soft and delicate in the grip of those long, tanned fingers.

She couldn’t get her feet to move, freezing where she stood, her eyes locking with his over the heads of the people around them. He knew what she had had on her mind; she could tell it from the faint fast frown that drew those dark brows together, the narrowing of the blue eyes.

‘Helena!’

Behind her, just beyond the doorway into the ballroom, Alyse heard an uncomfortably familiar male voice raised in greeting and just the sound of it brought a rush of a whole new set of feelings. In the space of an uneven heartbeat she was brought back to the moment she had arrived at the ball, the desperate plan, only half formed, to make sure that Marcus saw her with someone else so that then perhaps he would take no for an answer.

A swift sidelong glance over her shoulder brought confirmation of the slow creep of unease down her neck. Marcus was here. Suddenly, from wanting him to see her with someone else it had become the last thing she wanted. She wanted to get out of here now and let this evening that had suddenly turned magical in contrast to weeks of tension and strain continue. Pushing herself into action, she turned her feet towards Dario.

‘Thank you.’

It sounded as if she had run up a flight of steps rather than across the smooth marble tiling.

‘I’m going to need this...’ She was already pushing one arm into a sleeve of her coat as she spoke, manoeuvring herself so that she could hitch it up over her shoulder. ‘Have you seen the weather outside? It’s pouring with rain.’

The shiver she affected was meant to be in response to the conditions outside but it was given an added edge by the worrying sense of unease as she saw the way his gaze went over her head, skimming the entrance hall as if looking for someone.

Automatically, his hands came out to help her pull the other sleeve over her arm, lifting the fall of blonde hair from her shoulders and smoothing it down over the black velvet.

Hurry—hurry! Alyse urged him in the silence of her thoughts. Please, let’s get out of here before Marcus intervenes.

‘We’ll have to get a taxi...’ she said, pushing her arm under his and curling her hand around the strength of bone and muscle under the fine silk of his jacket. ‘Or we’ll get soaked.’

She was almost tugging him on his way, urging him towards the door.

‘No need,’ Dario muttered, nodding towards the uniformed man who held a large black umbrella that he had fetched from a nearby stand above their heads, protecting them from the lashing rain.

‘Your car, sir...’

The sleek black vehicle had come to a growling halt at the kerb, the back door opened for Alyse to make her way under the protection of the umbrella. She had only just slid into place on the soft leather seat when the door was slammed after her, and Dario made his way swiftly to the other side. An instant after that, the chauffeur, obviously needing no instructions as to their destination, put the car into motion as he pulled away from the kerb.

Alyse’s mood seesawed again, taking her from a need to escape to another, even more unsettling feeling. One that left her breathless and suddenly cold, in spite of the warmth inside the car. Dario’s fixed determination had disturbed her so that she could almost believe that she had been kidnapped, taken against her will.

And yet she knew she had been a party to it. More than that, she had been so swamped by the response of her senses that she wasn’t thinking straight. She had been burning up with hunger, the sensual need that had uncoiled in the pit of her stomach and radiated out along every nerve. If they could have moved then, been instantly transported from the ballroom to wherever they were going, then she wouldn’t have had a moment to think, to allow any hint of second thoughts to slide into her mind.

But now, when it seemed that the cold of the evening was seeping into her bones, a slow sneaking sense of apprehension destroyed that wonderful heated knowledge that this was right. That it was what she had been looking for all her life. The restrictions she’d had to put up with in order to help care for her ailing mother had limited her chances for the sort of fun and spontaneity her friends enjoyed. Tonight was going to be so very different.

Twisting in her seat, she glanced back the way they’d come, the brilliantly lit doorway to the hotel shielded from the rain by the canopy that flapped furiously in the wind. The weather had driven almost everyone indoors so there was only the doorman on duty. But as she watched a single figure emerged from the hotel doorway and stood, feet planted firmly apart on the red carpet, his whole body turned in their direction, his gaze obviously following the progress of the car as it sped away. The lamplight gleamed on the bright red-gold of his head, making it plain just who he was. He couldn’t be anyone else.

Marcus Kavanaugh. The man whose single-minded campaign to bully her into marrying him had blighted her life for the past few weeks. She had done everything she could to make it plain that he meant nothing to her, but it hadn’t worked. Of course she’d had to be polite. He was her father’s boss’s son after all. But politeness hadn’t worked. And now that her father had joined in the campaign to see them married, insisting it was the match of the century, she’d felt hounded, trapped, driven into a corner.

It was the memory of how the other man had behaved this morning that made her shudder faintly. She could still hear Marcus’s voice telling her that she would regret it if she gave him the runaround any more, and some dark edge to it had made her blood run cold. It was that that had pushed her into the plan she’d had for tonight.

Hastily, Alyse turned back, huddling into her coat.

‘Cold?’

Dario’s enquiry sounded innocuous but there was an edge to it that brought her eyes up to his in a rush, wary green meeting assessing blue.

‘You shivered,’ he pointed out.

‘Did I?’ The inanity of the conversation brought home to her the strangeness of the situation she was in. It was the sort of overly polite small talk you made with a complete stranger when you had just met for the first time.

But that was what Dario was. A stranger. A tall, dark, devastating stranger, and yet a man she had connected with from the start. One whose touch had lit a fire inside her when he’d held her on the dance floor. A man who had driven all thoughts of common sense or self-protection from her head when he had whispered, ‘Let’s go somewhere else...’ in the same moment she had used the exact same words.

Could this be real? She couldn’t have this sort of connection in so short a time. And yet this was what she had planned on happening all along. This was supposed to be her get-out-of-jail-free card, wasn’t it?

Once more, she made herself look back over her shoulder, seeing the blond man raise his hand to hail a taxi as the car turned a corner and he disappeared from sight. She couldn’t hold back a smile at the thought that, no matter what else happened, at this moment Marcus was very definitely out of the picture. The rush of the sense of freedom to her head was like the effect of strong alcohol.

‘Feeling better?’

He’d caught the smile—that much was obvious—and wanted an explanation for it. She was never going to tell him the real truth—but then that truth had nothing to do with him. Just as what happened from now on had nothing to do with Marcus. The result was the same, but the one thing she hadn’t expected when she’d come up with the whole crazy plan was how much she had wanted to do this.

‘I could feel even better,’ she murmured, sliding over the seat and moving closer to the big, lean body of Dario Olivero. Wanting, needing his arms around her again. ‘Yes,’ she sighed as the heat from his closeness thawed some of the chill of apprehension inside her. ‘Like that.’

* * *

He couldn’t see her face, Dario reflected as she rested her head against his chest. But the faint purr in her words told him it would still be there on her lips. She felt like a small cat, curled up close, the blonde silk of her hair brushing his chin, the aroma of her perfume swirling around him, making him inhale deeply to draw in more of it. Held as close as she was, she couldn’t be unaware of the heat and hardness of his body, the way his heart kicked up at every move she made so that it was almost impossible to keep his breathing steady and controlled. When her head tilted slightly upwards towards his, he knew that she wanted him to kiss her. But not now, not yet.

‘We’ll soon be there,’ he told her, the swift sidelong glance towards the chauffeur meant to imply that they needed to wait until they were alone. And that was definitely true. But there was more to it than that.

He wanted to know what that smile had meant. And why it had appeared on her lips, warming her expression, just after she had looked back through the car window. There had been nothing there to make her smile. Only that one glimpse of Marcus.

And Marcus was nothing to smile about.

Dario’s own smile, reflected in the black glass of the window, was grimly triumphant, the flash of lights as they passed showing up the cold curve of his lips, the determined set of his jaw. Marcus had lost this round—and, with any luck, the rest of the contest.

‘Just round this corner.’

And, as he spoke, the car swung round the bend, sending a spray of dark rainwater up over the kerb from a puddle that had gathered as a result of the storm. A short way down the road, they pulled up outside the building where his newly bought apartment took up the whole of the top floor.

‘We’re here,’ Dario urged Alyse, his tone suddenly rough with the knowledge that if he didn’t get her out of here and up to that penthouse fast then what little was left of the control that had been fraying mercilessly with every sway and pitch of the vehicle that brought her slender warmth even closer to him would snap completely. He would have to have her under him, his hands plundering her soft curves, her silken skin, and to hell with the audience of José the driver or anyone else.

‘Time to get inside...’

The image of being inside her that the words flung into his brain was almost his undoing. He grabbed at Alyse’s shoulders, wrenching her up from the half lying, half leaning position before he claimed her hands. Folding his around both of hers and pulling her along with him, he exited the car backwards, not even flinching as his broad shoulders met the force of the wind, the slash of the icy rain that was splattering down over his head.

‘Come on.’

He pulled his jacket up high to cover her head like an improvised umbrella, protecting that silky hair from the onslaught of the downpour.

‘José, I won’t need you any more tonight...’

He tossed the command at his driver as he slammed the car door shut behind them, not needing the man’s nod of agreement—or the knowing smile that said his employee had already recognised that fact before they’d arrived.

* * *

It was like travelling blind, Alyse reflected, her eyes not quite focusing in the glare of the brilliantly lit building after the darkness of the night. She knew that she was crossing a highly polished floor, heard Dario speak some greeting to the man at the desk as they passed, and then they were at the polished steel entry of a lift, the doors sliding open immediately in response to his long bronzed finger pressed on the call button.

So she had to be grateful for the curve of his arm around her. It felt safe and supportive there, the heat and scent of his body enclosing her, and it was as if that warmth was melting away the worries, the apprehension she had felt at first in the car. Now she felt her limbs soften, leaning towards him, resting her head, her weight against the power of his body. The clean scent of his skin surrounded her, blended with some sort of lime cologne, and she gave herself up to the delight of the physical sensations she was experiencing.

‘Alyse...’

His tone was soft, slightly roughened at the edges. She lifted her face, her eyes connecting with his, seeing the intense darkness of his pupils, the tiniest edge of blue around their rim. For a moment she was held, mesmerised, unable to look away, and instinctively her lips parted, a faint sigh escaping to blend with his hot breath as his mouth descended towards hers.

His kiss was warm, slow, infinitely seductive. It took her mouth in a wave of languorous delight, lifting her up onto her toes to wrap her arms around his neck, tangle her fingers in the black silk of his hair. The arm that was curled around her shoulder tightened sharply, drawing her closer, bringing her up against the hardness of his body. Lean, strong fingers stroked down the delicate skin of her neck, slipping under the collar of her coat, making her shiver in need. Her heart rate kicked up sharply, sending her blood pulsing through her body, so that she wriggled even closer in burning awareness.

He felt the same, she could tell. There was the undeniable evidence of the hard swell of arousal pressed into the bowl of her pelvis, the faint groan that escaped from between their joined lips before he brought his mouth down harder, stronger, crushing her lips back against her teeth.

‘Dario...’

Somehow she choked it out, not wanting to lose the pressure of his mouth on hers. He tasted wonderful, and the moment that his tongue slid over her lips, tracing the seam where they joined, had her sagging against him, losing her breath, losing all sense of where she was.

Would the lift never reach its destination? She wanted to be there—somewhere, as Dario had said, they could be alone together, private, intimate. Yet at the same time she didn’t want this moment to end. She wanted to go on and on for ever in this warmth and closeness.

But even as the thought crossed her mind the compartment jolted slightly, came to a halt, throwing her off balance and right into Dario’s arms as the doors slid open again.

‘We’re here.’

Somehow he managed to ease his keys from his pocket and unlock the door while still holding her close, never easing his grip on her arm, her waist.

In spite of the darkness it was obvious that the room was huge, no light illuminating it other than the reflection of the buildings and the streetlamps far below. The faint gleam of the heavy swell of the river was like a silver ribbon, and over to the left the ethereal spider web of a blue circle that looked impossibly delicate to be the London Eye.

She barely had time to adjust to the change in light or look round any more before Dario had tossed his jacket away to the side, heedless of whether it landed on a nearby chair or not, and reached for her again.

‘Come here,’ he muttered, his voice rough, his accent thickening on the words. ‘I’ve been waiting—wanting to do this ever since the moment I saw you.’

His hands were clamped around her shoulders, rough and bruising, but Alyse neither fully registered it nor truly cared. All that mattered was the passion of that beautifully cruel mouth on her lips, on her skin, the pressure of the hard frame of his chest crushing her breasts. The heat of him surrounded her, flooding her body along with the burn of her own arousal until she was astonished that the pair of them didn’t go up in flames.

‘I—I—yes...’

It was all she could manage, all she could snatch in, in the moment he allowed her to breathe before his mouth took hers again. His hands closed over her arms as he swung her round, half walking, half carrying her towards the shadowy shape of a huge dark sofa. Her shoes slipped from her feet as he lifted her up, left behind on the soft carpet as his right hand reached round to the back of her neck, finding the zip at the neckline of her dress, swiftly and expertly tugging it down. The release from even the slight constriction of her clothing was like a rush of release to her feelings. Inside the delicate lace of her bra, her breasts stung, pressing against the soft silk, seeming to demand the attention of those strong, rough-palmed hands, and she moaned her encouragement as he stroked his powerful fingers down her body, making her writhe upwards to meet his touch, wanting it stronger, harder. Wanting more.

Then she was lying on her back on the settee, the soft buttery leather cool against the skin that his hands had exposed. And Dario was coming down on top of her, the heavy heat of his skin, the weight of his frame crushing her back into the cushions. One long, finely trousered leg pushed between hers, easing them apart so that she could feel the swollen heat of him pressing against her, crushing into her pelvis, coming so close to the throbbing core of her femininity where the bite of primal need fought against the restriction of their clothing.

‘Dario...’

She was reaching for his hands, wanting them on her, wanting to place them where she needed his touch most. She was trying to draw them down to her yearning flesh, but at the same time she wanted to reach for him, hungry for the heat of his skin, the taste of him hard upon her mouth.

‘I want—I wa...’

But her scrambled words were halted, all train of thought shattered by a sudden violent sound. Someone was at the door, banging hard and slamming a fist against the wood until it seemed that it might actually shatter under its force.

‘What?’

Braced hard against the leather settee, Dario froze, his whole body stiffening, his dark head coming up, slightly cocked towards the door, listening intently.

‘Who?’ Alyse whispered, but he stilled her with a glance, laying one finger across her mouth to silence her. And now, although the scent of his skin was so very close, when all she had to do was to open her mouth and take him in, taste the intensely personal flavour of him as she had wanted just moments before, it was suddenly the last thing she could do. The last thing she dared to do until she knew who had intruded on their seclusion, blasting their way into the heated intimacy they had created and threatening to destroy it totally.

‘Olivero!’ Another bang at the door clashed with the darkly furious use of Dario’s name. ‘Open this door, damn you! Open it now!’

A slight gleam in the moonlight showed how Dario’s eyes slanted once, briefly, towards where Alyse’s head rested against the leather-covered arm of the sofa, then swung back again in the direction of the door.

‘Open this door, you bastard! I know you’re in there—and Alyse with you too.’

‘No!’

The word escaped Alyse in a panic as she recognised the sound, even though distorted through the wood. She knew just who was on the other side of that door, and the fury in his tone reminded her uncomfortably of his threatening warning earlier that day.

‘Olivero, you coward, come out and face me...’

‘Dario—no!’

Alyse’s cry was drowned by another slam of a heavy fist against the wood, and as she reached for him Dario was already levering himself up and off her, that last insult clearly too much for him to take.

Not troubling to rake a hand through his disordered hair or even to smooth down his rumpled clothing, he was striding towards the door, twisting the handle with a violent movement and yanking it open ferociously.

‘Well?’

The momentary silence that greeted his appearance, the angry demand of his single word, made Alyse’s skin crawl, a cold slimy trail of apprehension sliding down her spine. From where she lay she could see the door, and the man who stood on the other side of it. She had been right, as she knew she’d had to be. The red-gold hair, clashing painfully with a furious scarlet face, the blazing blue eyes were unmistakable. The furious intruder was Marcus Kavanaugh.

But what was he doing here? And how?

He had seen them leave the hotel, had watched them drive off together. She had seen him staring after them when she had looked back through the rain. But how had he known just where to find them? He wouldn’t have had time to catch a cab and trail them to Dario’s apartment, so how had he known to come straight here and to catch them...?

‘Alyse...’

Marcus had turned his attention to her now and, with a small sound of horrified embarrassment, she scrambled up from her place on the settee, forcing herself to her feet. She might have wanted him to get the message—but not like this.

‘What the hell are you doing here?’

‘I would have thought that was obvious.’

Marcus’s spluttering blaze of fury was bad enough, but the edge of laughter in Dario’s retort was far worse, setting her teeth on edge and bringing home to her just how dreadful this must all look. She had been sprawled on the settee, her hair tumbling down around her face and shoulders, her legs wide apart, and her clothes...

Cheeks flaming, she tugged her skirt down, struggled to pull her dress up around her shoulders once again, desperate to restore her appearance to a degree of order. Her hands shook so badly that she couldn’t reach the zip to pull it up and when she tried to draw Dario’s attention to the fact, telegraphing wildly with her eyes and her brows that she needed help, his only response was a blank-eyed stare. Either he didn’t understand or...

Her heart quailed inside her, her stomach turning over in sudden nausea. Was it possible that Dario knew only too well what was troubling her but had no intention of making any move to help her? It certainly looked that way. He had barely spared her a glance; instead, all his attention was focused on his raging adversary.

‘I— This isn’t what you think, Marcus...’

She stumbled over the words, lost them completely when she saw the way that Dario turned, casting a darkly contemptuous look in her direction as if he could barely believe that she had actually said such a stupid thing. Listening to herself as the idiotic comment hung in the air between them, she couldn’t believe it either. There was only one possible interpretation of the scene in front of Marcus, and that was the right one. It had also been the one she had wanted him to have, but that had been before this dark fury had erupted around her—and before Dario had seemed to turn away from her.

‘And what the hell else would I think it might be?’ Marcus spat at her now, making her flinch from the poisonous venom of his tone. ‘Unless you’re trying to claim that he forced you?’

‘I— He... No—I’m not claiming that...’

How could she do any such thing, even to save herself from this hellish embarrassment? She just wished that Dario would say something—anything—to break the tension that stretched tight between the three of them. But after that one demonic touch of humour, the coldly blazing scorn he had turned on her just moments before, he had now frozen where he stood, arms crossed over his broad chest, dark brows drawn together, a silent, watchful observer of the scene in front of him.

‘Not that I’d put it past him,’ Marcus stunned her by declaring now. ‘A man with his reputation.’

‘Rep...reputation?’ Alyse managed, stunned to learn that Marcus seemed to know something about Dario—more, in fact, than she did herself. ‘What...?’

But Marcus wasn’t listening, intent instead on turning the venom he had directed at her previously onto Dario himself.

‘Dragged up in the gutter by a mother who was anyone’s for the price of—’

It was only the tiniest movement. Just a tensing of Dario’s long body, a curl of his fists, a hint of a step forward. But that, when combined with the black thundercloud of his frown, the way his sensual mouth was clamped hard and tight into a thin line, was enough of a warning to have Marcus biting off the last of his insulting sentence and clearly backing down. He obviously didn’t think that it was safe to risk baiting Dario any further, however much he might want to.

And the other man’s reaction turned Alyse’s legs to water at the memory of the way that this had been just what she had planned as part of her original scheme in the first place. It had all seemed so exciting, so brilliant—so possible when she had come up with the idea as a way of getting rid of Marcus’s unwanted attentions. Give him the impression that she was involved with another man, that she was seeing someone else—maybe even sleeping with someone else—and then surely he would back off and leave her in peace?

But now, finding herself in exactly the situation she had anticipated, with Marcus at the door, having found her and Dario in a decidedly compromising situation—far more compromising than she had ever planned—things were not at all as she had foreseen. For one thing, Marcus, though looking disgusted and furious, didn’t seem to have the intention of turning round and walking away, as he had in her mind when she’d imagined this happening.

And Dario...

She risked a glance at the tall, dark, glowering man to her left, and immediately wished she hadn’t. He wasn’t actually snarling but he might as well have been and she could practically see his hackles rising in hostile threat to the intruder into his territory. The sparks that seemed to flash between the two men made her feel like some tasty but already wounded prey that was the subject of a face to face confrontation between two powerful and equally ravenous lions.

Giving up on trying to fasten her dress, she folded her arms tightly around her waist, as much to hold herself together as to keep the blue silk from falling into a pool on the carpet at her feet.

‘No matter what my reputation,’ Dario drawled now, making Alyse start because she was so used to him being silent, ‘it seems that Alyse doesn’t give a damn about it, mi caro fratello.’

My—what? Alyse shook her head faintly, unable to believe she had heard right. The stress must be getting to her so that she was imagining things. He couldn’t have said...

But, whatever he had said, it had been deliberately provocative. And it had the desired effect, enraging Marcus so that his whole face went white with fury, pulling taut over his bones.

‘Marcus...’ she tried, desperate to have this appalling stalemate broken, to avoid what she was now starting to fear might actually bring these two to blows. There was something here between these two that was evil. Something she didn’t understand but if she could just avoid an actual fight...

‘Look, I’m sorry if this has upset you, but really you know I never said...’

He wasn’t listening, all his attention focused on Dario’s hard, set face. But, even as she watched, Alyse was stunned to see the faint flicker of a smile on the Italian’s sensual lips. A smile that was there and gone again in a moment and had nothing warm about it at all.

‘I could kill you...’

Marcus’s threat, directed at Dario’s impassive face, was a low, savage mutter, one that sent a horrified shiver slithering down Alyse’s spine. In a panic she stepped forward, her hand coming out as she forgot about holding her dress up and could only think about stopping him.

‘Marcus, I tried to tell you that I couldn’t see any future for us, so I thought—’

‘Thought you’d teach me a lesson?’

‘No—I...’

But her voice had no strength, no conviction. Wasn’t that really what she had wanted to do? To convince him that she was not for him? That she wasn’t at all interested in the proposal he had pushed at her so unexpectedly and had kept pushing for days.

‘You thought you’d rub my face in it,’ he snarled, the look he turned on her scraping over her body like the burn of acid.

It was only now, when that hateful look paused and lingered deliberately, that Alyse became aware of the betraying damp, darkened patches directly over her breasts where Dario’s hot mouth had sought out the sensitive peaks that had strained against her bra. The realisation dried her throat in a moment.

‘No...’ she tried but, even though her lips moved, no sound managed to come out. And when she glanced uncertainly at Dario, the darkness and focus of his eyes told her that he had something else on his mind other than belief in her declaration.

From a shadowy corner of her thoughts came an uncomfortable memory of the time in the car when she had looked back and seen Marcus staring after them. She’d been careless enough to smile just briefly. And Dario had caught it. Could he think this was what she had wanted?

‘Well, you couldn’t have made a better job of it than this, you bitch.’ Marcus was continuing his rant. ‘You must have known if there was one thing that would guarantee I’d want nothing more to do with you—something that would turn my stomach—it was the sight of you getting down and dirty with my bastard brother.’

CHAPTER THREE

MY BASTARD BROTHER.

This time there could be no doubt about it, though Alyse’s thoughts reeled in disbelief at what she heard. She hadn’t been sure earlier—mi caro fratello—but in plain, straightforward English it couldn’t be clearer.

But that just wasn’t possible—was it? Marcus was a solid, stolid Englishman with the pale colouring and eyes that marked him out as pure Anglo-Saxon. He had nothing of Dario’s stunning golden skin and sleek black hair. Those blue, blue eyes that met hers in a stare of blank confrontation were the only thing that could seem to connect the two. And bastard brother...

‘Half-brother, to be more accurate,’ Dario put in now, though it stuck in his throat to even acknowledge that connection. ‘Though definitely the bastard.’

She hadn’t known that—or certainly not all of it, he realised. If the confusion that was written on her pale face was genuine. Somehow she had managed to avoid hearing about the scandal that had exploded in the gossip columns years ago when he had turned up at the Kavanaugh home to carry out his mother’s last wishes and claim acknowledgement from his family. But that was impossible, surely. When her father was employed by Marcus and his father, tangled up in everything the younger man did, then even Lady Alyse Gregory must know something of what was going on.

‘I...’

That unsettled stare went from his face to Marcus’s and back again, no sign of anything but confusion showing in it. So it hadn’t been because of who he was that she had chosen him. Obviously any man would have done.

So would she have gone through with it if they hadn’t been so rudely interrupted? Or had she calculated this down to the precise second so that they would be caught together at just the last possible moment?

‘The last man whose leavings I’d want to touch.’ Marcus was really feeling savage now.

Oh, that had hit home. He had caught her on the raw there, and Dario had to admit to a twist of admiration at the way her head came up, her eyes flashed. At last she looked like the woman she was. The product of years of aristocratic heritage, of pure blue-blooded breeding. The woman Henry Kavanaugh dreamed of having as the mother of his grandchildren.

‘I’m nobody’s leavings! And if you hadn’t refused to take no for an answer, then I wouldn’t have been forced to...’

The impetus given her by the rush of indignation had obviously ebbed, and she turned a wary, uncertain look on Dario, clearly realising that she had just dug herself even deeper into the hole she found herself in. There was more to that look too. She wasn’t asking but summoning him to her aid. She actually expected him to come to her assistance, confirm her story. But if she thought he was going to give her a helping hand, then she had better think again. That ‘forced’ had hit home, barbs sticking into his skin.

‘I wouldn’t have had to...’

The careful amendment did nothing to soothe Dario’s mood. He was keeping out of this one until she had decided which way she was going to jump.

‘You’ll regret this.’ Marcus’s tone was low and savage.

‘I already do.’

So now they were getting closer to the truth. That last comment had the ring of conviction in it. Obviously Lady Alyse Gregory would regret her unthinking and indiscreet lapse of control. Particularly as she had now discovered that she had thrown herself into the arms of the Italian bastard that Marcus had revealed him to be.

Clearly his half-brother thought so too. There was actually a smile of triumph in those pale eyes.

‘And nothing happened? Then come with me now and we’ll forget all about this foolishness.’

Wrong move, brother, Dario thought to himself. Even on his short acquaintance with her, he was pretty damn sure that Alyse would not respond well to that autocratic ‘come with me now’. The only way he could have made matters worse would have been by snapping his fingers at her as if he was calling a dog to heel.

And Alyse Gregory was no obedient pet. That was plain from the way her mouth tightened, and she shook back the mane of golden hair.

‘No.’

She had to say it, Alyse acknowledged inwardly. There was no other option. Given a choice in the matter, she would have walked out of here right now and never looked back at either Dario or Marcus. She had no idea just what these two brothers—brothers!—were up to but she had no wish to get caught in the middle of whatever personal war they were intent on fighting.

But leaving meant letting Marcus think that he had won. And that was the last thing she wanted. Hadn’t she set out on this crazy venture in the first place as a way of making sure that he left her alone? That he stopped plaguing her with expressions of how beneficial it would be for the two of them, blending the aristocratic blood of her line with the wealth and security that he could bring to the table. She had never been able to get him to accept her refusal, and if she left with him now then it would all be to do again.

‘No,’ she tried again when he looked unconvinced.

‘Alyse...’

‘The lady said no,’ Dario drawled unexpectedly from behind her. ‘You lose.’

You lose! If earlier she had felt like some vulnerable prey, now the sensation was much more like some tasty bone being fought over by two bad-tempered dogs.

What did he think she was? Some sort of trophy—just a notch on his bedpost? Not that they had got as far as the bed! Just let them get rid of Marcus and she would make him pay for that.

Dario moved past her, taking hold of the door and moving it to block Marcus’s entrance.

‘Goodnight, Marcus,’ he said pointedly.

‘I swear you’ll regret this.’ It was so different this time. The voice of darkness with threat threaded through every word. ‘You’ll...’

‘Goodnight, Marcus.’

Dario pushed the door even closer to being shut, blocking out the sight of Marcus’s enraged face. Alyse found that she was holding her breath, not knowing what she would do if he refused to leave. Would they have to call the police?

She could just imagine what her father’s reaction would be if she was involved in some scandal that hit the newspapers, tonight of all nights. He had asked her—begged her—not to rile Kavanaugh, to keep the family name out of the gossip columns. It would just destroy her mother, who had recently retreated into one of her black depressions. That was why she had decided on the plan that was supposed to make Marcus reject the idea of marriage. A plan that now seemed to have had more effect than she could ever have dreamed of.

‘Damn you to hell, Olivero!’ Marcus flung one more violent outburst at the other man.

But then, to Alyse’s relief, he finally turned and marched off down the corridor, swearing as he went.

‘At last.’

Dario kicked the door shut behind him, his smile an expression of grim satisfaction as he turned back to Alyse.

‘I think we’ve seen the back of him.’

‘Mmm...’

Alyse was preoccupied with finally hitching her dress up so that it sat securely on her shoulders again, struggling to get her hands on the pull of the zip at her waist, to restore her appearance to normality.

‘So where were we?’

She hadn’t seen him come closer, prowling soft as a hunting cat, so she jumped violently when he touched her, warm and soft on her cheek.

‘What?’ Her head snapped up, her fumbling grip freezing on the tab of the zip.

His hand was on her hair, long fingers tangling in the fall of blonde, smoothing through the silky strands when she realised just what he meant and tensed up sharply.

‘You think we— You can just take up from where you left off?’

‘Why not?’ He actually sounded genuinely puzzled. ‘What’s changed?’

‘What’s... You...’

The words spluttered to a halt inside her head, shock, disbelief and sheer blind fury warring to find the uppermost spot. Fury won. It was the memory of that casually triumphant ‘You lose

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