‘This isn’t a social call, Cassandra. I’ve come to take you back to Rome.’

Marco couldn’t have said anything to make her rally faster. ‘I beg your pardon?’ she demanded.

‘Well, you can’t stay here.’

He glanced around, and by the time his assessing stare returned to her face it was to see her cheeks flaming with the knowledge that he was right. She wasn’t finding this pregnancy easy. She was sick and weak, and he doubted she could work in her current condition. How was she supposed to support herself, let alone a baby … a baby that might be his child? He couldn’t take that chance. More importantly, she couldn’t take a chance with her child, and they both knew that with her godmother away Cassandra was alone, with no one to turn to.

No one except him.

‘Pack a small case,’ he advised. ‘We can buy anything else you need in Rome. We’ll leave as soon as you’re ready.’

‘I haven’t agreed,’ she pointed out, raising her chin to stare at him with defiance.

‘But you will,’ he said.

One Night With Consequences

When one night … leads to pregnancy!

When succumbing to a night of unbridled desire it’s impossible to think past the morning after!

But, with the sheets barely settled, that little blue line appears on the pregnancy test and it doesn’t take long to realise that one night of white-hot passion has turned into a lifetime of consequences!

Only one question remains:

How do you tell a man you’ve just met that you’re about to share more than just his bed?

Find out in:

Prince Nadir’s Secret Heir by Michelle Conder March 2015

Carrying the Greek’s Heir by Sharon Kendrick April 2015

Married for Amari’s Heir by Maisey Yates July 2015

Bound by the Billionaire’s Baby by Cathy Williams July 2015

From One Night to Wife by Rachael Thomas September 2015

Her Nine Month Confession by Kim Lawrence September 2015

An Heir Fit for a King by Abby Green October 2015

Larenzo’s Christmas Baby by Kate Hewitt November 2015

An Illicit Night with the Greek by Susanna Carr February 2016

Look for more One Night With Consequences coming soon!

If you missed any of these fabulous stories,

they can be found at millsandboon.co.uk

Bound to the Tuscan Billionaire
Susan Stephens

www.millsandboon.co.uk

SUSAN STEPHENS was a professional singer before meeting her husband on the Mediterranean island of Malta. In true Mills & Boon Modern Romance style they met on Monday, became engaged on Friday and married three months later. Susan enjoys entertaining, travel and going to the theatre. To relax she reads, cooks and plays the piano, and when she’s had enough of relaxing she throws herself off mountains on skis, or gallops through the countryside singing loudly.

MILLS & BOON

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For my Tuscan teammates, Linda, Ann, and the inimitable Sharon.

Contents

Cover

Introduction

One Night With Consequences

Title Page

About the Author

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

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

PLUNGING HER SPADE into the rich moist earth of Tuscany, Cass smiled as she reflected on her good luck in landing the job in Italy. She loved nothing more than being outdoors, using her body to the full. And where better than here, to an accompaniment of birdsong and the gurgle of a crystal-clear river. Her job was to help out at a grand estate over the planting season.

The staff had a day off on Wednesdays to break up the week, so she had the place to herself, making it all too easy to imagine that she was the chatelaine in charge of the glorious grounds—though perhaps not kitted out in mud-caked boots, braless in a skimpy vest she’d ripped on some barbed wire, topped off with a baseball cap that was as frayed and faded as her shorts!

The estate was miles from anywhere and the solitude was bliss, especially after the clamour of the supermarket where she worked back home, and being on her own was better than facing the owner of the estate. Marco di Fivizzano, an Italian industrialist, hadn’t been near the place since she’d arrived. She was in no hurry to meet a man who, according to the press, was as bloodless and cold as the Cararra marble he mined.

She didn’t need to worry about him, Cass mused as she stabbed her spade into the ground. She couldn’t imagine a man like Marco di Fivizzano taking time out of his busy schedule to drive down from Rome to his country estate in the middle of the week. When she’d asked Maria and Giuseppe—housekeeper and handyman, respectively—if and when she was likely to meet her boss, they’d just looked at each other and shrugged.

Which was probably as well, Cass reflected as she returned to vigorously prepping the ground for the seedlings she was planting. She had no problem with hard work. Tugging her forelock was something else.

She’d always been a rebel, though a quiet one, all the rebellion being in her head. Dumb insolence, her headmistress had called it, when Cass, at seven, had refused to cry on the day she’d been made to stand on the school stage as all the pupils had trooped past. That had been the headmistress’s idea to shame her on the day Cass’s parents’ had been arrested for drug offences. Young as she had been, she had determined never to be bullied again.

One thing still perplexed her. If her parents hadn’t been the type of people the headmistress had wanted to encourage, why had the school been so keen to take their money?

She couldn’t stand snobbery either. Her late father, better known as the infamous rock star Jackson Rich, could easily afford the school’s extortionate fees, but that hadn’t stopped the staff resenting him, his beautiful wife and Cass, his quiet, plain daughter.

Leave the past in the past where it belongs, and enjoy the Tuscan sunshine...

It was easy to do that, Cass reflected happily. Dappled sunlight sifting through the trees warmed her skin, and the scent of wild oregano was intoxicating. It was unseasonably warm for springtime in Italy, and how much better was this than her old job, squashed up in a stall, bashing the life out of a till at the local supermarket?

Closing her eyes, she smiled as she weighed up her choices: a nylon uniform that gave her static and stifled her; or the comfortable outfit she was wearing today?

No contest.

She loved working with plants, and had begged the store manager to allow her to work in the garden section, promising him that his plants would never droop again if she were in charge. He’d given her this weird look and said he liked his women clean and free from mud. She’d handed in her notice the same day.

Wiping the back of her arm across her face, she turned full circle with her arms outstretched as if sunlight were something she could touch. Birds were singing, bees were buzzing, and she could already see the fruits of her labours in fresh green shoots. On an impulse she reached for her phone to take a selfie to send to the godmother she adored and had lived with since her parents’ death. When she’d taken this job she’d had it in mind to save money to buy a plane ticket for her godmother to visit her son in Australia. It would have been nice to be able buy it in time for his birthday, but that was a dream too far.

After emailing the shot, she received a reply from her godmother almost at once:

You look as if you’re having a good time! Suggest a wash before anyone sees you. xoxo

With a happy laugh Cass reached up to brush away a bee, only to realise that the sound she could hear wasn’t an insect but something much larger...something coming steadily closer, casting a pall over the flawless Tuscan day. Her heart rate doubled as a black helicopter swooped over the trees and hovered overhead. It blotted out the sun and obliterated the calm with noise and dust. Shielding her eyes, she tried to see who was inside, but as ‘Fivizzano Inc.’ was emblazoned on the side, she didn’t have to test her imagination too far. Her best guess was that ‘the Master’, as Giovanni and Maria referred to He who must be obeyed, had arrived. He couldn’t have told anyone he was coming or Giovanni and Maria would never have taken the day off.

She could handle it, Cass determined. She was hardly a stranger to awkward situations. She would simply stay out of his way.

Her heart beat wildly as the helicopter descended slowly like a sinister black bird, flattening the grass and driving the songbirds from the trees in a panic-stricken flock. She hadn’t met anyone who travelled by helicopter since she’d been a little girl in her parents’ exotic world. Thrusting her spade into the ground, she realised her hands were shaking.

Wiping her hands on her shorts, she stood rooted to the spot as the rotors slowed to a petulant whine. The passenger door opened and a tall, commanding figure, dressed immaculately for the city, sprang to the ground. Marco di Fivizzano was infinitely better looking than the press suggested, and for a moment she stood trapped in his stare.

What had got into her? She’d done nothing wrong.

Who the hell...? Marco’s frown deepened. Then he remembered vaguely that his PA had mentioned something about temporary staff for the summer. He was in no mood for dealing with that now. Surely Giovanni and Maria would have laid out the ground rules—that no one approached him when he was here on his Tuscan estate.

Swearing softly under his breath, he remembered that today was Maria and Giuseppe’s day off. He had been in such a hurry to leave the city for the country that his only thought had been how fast he could get here. Now he had some scruffy youth to deal with. He would have expected a new member of his gardening team to be an older and more experienced man, not some beardless boy. Coming closer, he stopped dead in his tracks as she turned to face him.

A grubby urchin? No make-up? Ragged clothes? Hair hidden beneath a faded baseball cap?

Legs like a colt...body like a ripe fruit, bra-free nipples pressing imperatively against her fine cotton top, her young face work-flushed and appealing...

His body responded violently and with approval. Beneath the mud, sweat, and rosy cheeks stood a very attractive young woman. The cap was crammed down hard on her head, with the brim pulled low to shade her eyes from the sun, as if she cared nothing for vanity—and that in itself was a novelty. Her clothes consisted of a ripped and mud-daubed singlet that clung lovingly to her full, pert breasts, while the frayed shorts emphasised the length of her slender legs. Striding up to her, he saw that she wasn’t as young as he’d first thought, and neither was she intimidated by him—far from it. This girl wasn’t afraid of anything, he sensed as she held his stare.

‘And you are?’ he prompted shortly.

In contrast to his irritable mood, she appeared to be relaxed and slightly bemused.

‘Cassandra Rich. Your new gardener?’

Something about the surname chimed in his head, but he pushed that aside for now. Evaluating staff was his strength. The success of his business had been founded on that skill.

He stared deep into a frank, cornflower-blue gaze and ran a quick assessment. She was fresh, bright and intelligent. Inner strength, combined with the summing up she was giving him, was so novel and unexpected that he almost broke into a smile—something he did so rarely that his body took the cue and responded more insistently.

‘I’m here for the summer,’ she volunteered, glancing around.

Good. That gave him time to work with, he reasoned dryly.

Was he in lust with this woman?

Possibly. She was so unlike the sophisticated types he was used to she required further study—and a category all her own.

‘Where’s the rest of the gardening team?’ he demanded, frowning.

‘They’re taking staggered holidays,’ she explained with a shrug, drawing his attention to her bright blue eyes as she pushed a lock of her honey-gold hair away from them. ‘That’s why I’m here,’ she added, ‘to plug the gap.’

He had moved on from assessing her unusually forward manner to wondering about the rest of her hair, hidden beneath the ugly cap. He could so easily imagine freeing it and seeing it cascade down her back, just before he fisted a hank of it to pull her head back to kiss her throat.

‘You can handle this entire estate on your own?’ he demanded sceptically, bringing himself back with difficulty to the business side of this encounter.

‘I’ll have to, won’t I?’ she said. ‘At least until the others return.’

‘Yes, you will,’ he confirmed sharply, still trying to work out whether her manner was impudent or overly straightforward. Meanwhile, she was staring at him inquisitively, as she might study an unusual exhibit in a gallery. They were polar opposites, curious about each other—the billionaire, hard and driven, and the mystery girl who gave casual a new edge.

His groin tightened when she smiled. He liked the way her full lips curved and her ski-slope nose wrinkled attractively.

‘I’m not as helpless as I look,’ she assured him. ‘And I promise I won’t let you down.’

Her promise pleased him. ‘If you were helpless you wouldn’t be employed here.’

He turned away, knowing he should feel exhausted, but he was suddenly wide-awake.

He hadn’t slept for the past twenty-four hours as he’d wrestled a trade agreement to the table that would benefit not just his own group of companies but his country. Word of his success had spread like wildfire in the power halls of Rome, attracting lean, predatory women with crippling shoes and sprayed-on clothes—another reason he had been pleased to leave the city. He could have called any one of them to accompany him to Tuscany. They were decorative and efficient and they knew the score, but none of them had appealed. He didn’t know what he wanted, but it wasn’t that.

‘If there’s anything I can do for you?’ the girl called after him, stopping him in his tracks.

Was she referring to a cup of coffee or something more?

‘No. Thank you.’ He didn’t want company, he reminded himself. At least not yet.

Success in business rode him. It also turned him on. He’d been cramped up in the city for too long. He was a physical man, bound by convention in a custom-made suit, who was forced to spend most of his working life in air-conditioned offices when what he longed for was his wild land in Tuscany. Tucked between majestic granite mountains, his country estate was an indulgence he chose not to share with anyone—certainly not with some member of his part-time staff.

‘Anything at all?’ she pressed.

Did she have any idea how provocative she was? As he had turned to face her she had opened her arms wide, putting her impressive breasts on show.

‘Nothing. Thank you,’ he repeated irritably. ‘Get back to your gardening.’

He needed relief in the form of a woman, but this woman was too young and too inexperienced for him to waste his time on.

He ground his jaw with impatience when she started to follow him, and made a gesture to indicate that she should go back. The only conversation he was interested in was with real people like Maria and Giuseppe, and he resented her intrusion. She had changed the dynamics completely. She was an outsider, an interloper, and though she might hold appeal, was that smile as innocent as it looked?

If there was one thing he understood, it was the needs of a woman’s body and the workings of her mind, but this girl was so different it frustrated him that he had yet to make a judgement about her.

Cass shivered involuntarily. What was wrong with her? After deciding the safest thing was to steer clear of Marco di Fivizzano, she was doing the absolute opposite. It was as if her feet had a mind of their own and had decided to follow him to the house. She should know better, when he came from the same shallow, glitzy world as her parents—

‘Watch out!’ he snapped.

‘Sorry.’ She jumped back with alarm, realising he’d stopped, and she’d almost cannoned into him.

‘Have you nothing better to do than follow me to the house?’ he demanded in a tone that spoke of deals hard won and nights without sleep.

‘I’ve finished for the day,’ she explained, ‘and I just thought—’

‘I might need help?’ he queried. He stared down at her from his great height as if she were an irritation he didn’t yet have an answer to. ‘If you’re going to be here for the summer, you’d better tell me something about yourself.’

Her brain had stalled beneath the blazing stare. What could she tell him?

How much did she want to tell him?

‘Come on—keep up,’ he insisted, striding ahead. ‘Let’s start with where you come from.’

‘England—the UK.’ She had to jog to keep up with him. ‘It’s a region called the Lake District. I don’t expect you—’

‘I know the area. Family?’

The word ‘family’ was enough to spear her with ugly memories. That was what she didn’t want to talk about, let alone take her thoughts back to the day a small bewildered child had stood at the side of the family swimming pool looking down at her parents floating, drowned after a drug-fuelled fight. She settled for the heavily censored version.

‘I live with my godmother,’ she explained.

‘No parents?’

‘Both dead.’

‘My condolences.’

‘It was a long time ago.’

Almost eighteen years, Cass realised with shock. She’d been so young she’d hardly known how to grieve for them. She hadn’t really known them. She’d had one carer after another while they’d been on the road with her father’s band. Her emotions had died along with her parents, until her godmother had arrived to sweep Cass up in a hug. She’d taken Cass home to her modest cottage in the Lake District where the only drug was the scenery and her godmother’s beautiful garden. Cass had lived there ever since, confident in her godmother’s love and safe in a well-ordered life.

Maybe part of her had hidden in this security, she reflected now. That would account for a personality as compelling as Marco di Fivizzano giving her such a jolt. After her turbulent childhood, she had welcomed her godmother’s cocoon of love, but increasingly had come to realise that something was missing from her life. Challenge. That was why she was here in Tuscany. This job was out of her comfort zone, and never more so than now.

‘You are lucky to have a godmother to live with,’ Marco di Fivizzano observed as he strode ahead of her.

‘Yes. I am,’ she agreed, chasing after him.

The warmth and strength of her godmother’s love had never wavered, and when the day had come when Cass had been ready to fly the nest, she had helped her to get the job here in Tuscany.

She stood back when they arrived at the front door.

‘Come into the house,’ Fivizzano instructed when she hesitated.

She’d never been beyond the kitchen. She’d never entered the house through the front door. Her room was in an annex across the courtyard. The house was grand. She was not. She was covered in mud and she knew how hard Maria worked to keep the place spotless.

But the real reason for her hesitation was that she didn’t want to be alone in the house with him.

‘It’s Giuseppe and Maria’s day off,’ she explained, still hovering outside the door.

‘And?’ he demanded impatiently.

‘I’m sure if they had expected you—’

‘I don’t pay my staff to expect.’

She flinched when he added, ‘Do you have a problem with that?’

Yes. She had a problem. She had never met a man so rude or so insensitive. Giuseppe and Maria would do anything for him. Did he know that? And she was definitely not going inside the house. ‘I’m sure Maria must have left something in the fridge for you to eat—’

His expression blackened. ‘I beg your pardon?’

She had to remind herself that she loved this job, and that it would help to pay for her godmother’s trip to Australia, and therefore she should say nothing and just get on with it.

‘As Maria isn’t here, you’ll have to do,’ he said, giving her a scathing appraisal. ‘Clean yourself up and fix lunch.’

Her face blazed red beneath the arrogant stare. She had to remind herself that she had dealt with plenty of difficult customers at the supermarket. Sucking in a steadying breath, she told herself that for all his immense wealth Marco di Fivizzano was just another man.

Just another man?

She would have to remind herself of that several times a day, Cass guessed wryly, but she couldn’t deny that if there was one thing she loved it was a challenge.

‘My cooking isn’t up to much,’ she admitted, kicking off her boots.

‘Do what you can.’

Senna pods in his omelette sprang to mind.

Stepping inside the beautiful old house, she was silenced for a moment. Overwhelmed by its beauty, she stared around in awe. This had to be the most beautiful hallway outside a palace. It was square and elegant...beautifully proportioned, with a high, vaulted ceiling. It was decorated with burnished antiques, as well as the most exquisite rugs—rugs Marco di Fivizzano was simply striding over in his outdoor shoes on his way to the foot of an impressive mahogany staircase.

‘You can clean yourself up in the back kitchen,’ he instructed, as if she were a latter-day Cinderella. ‘An omelette shouldn’t be beyond you.’

‘I’ll pick some fresh herbs—’

Her suggestion was wasted. He was already halfway up the stairs.

So much for that challenge she’d been looking forward to!

Her first assessment of Marco di Fivizzano had been correct. He was insufferably rude and incredibly insensitive. She didn’t even register on his radar. He was hungry and he expected to be fed.

Then she remembered with a little pulse of interest that Marco di Fivizzano was always hungry, according to the scandal sheets—and she doubted they were talking about food. He was also a spectacular lover, according to the same magazines...

She definitely needed that wash down in cold water before she saw him again.

Having cleaned herself up, she went back into the garden and, selecting a clump of herbs, she slashed them with her knife.

No supressed emotions to deal with at all, Cass concluded with amusement.

As she walked back to the house she glanced at the upstairs windows. She could just imagine all that brute force naked beneath the shower. She’d always had a down-to-earth attitude when it came to men and sex, though living in the remote beauty of the Lake District with her godmother had hardly provided her with a wide pool of men to choose from. And when she had chosen, she’d got it wrong. She’d had one or two unsuccessful attempts to make a go of a relationship, but the men had disappointed her in a way she couldn’t really explain. There had been nothing wrong with them. They just hadn’t fired her imagination, and she had always dreamed of being swept away.

One thing was sure, nothing could have prepared her poor frustrated body for the arrival of a force of nature like Marco di Fivizzano.

Sheathing her knife, she wiped a hand across the back of her neck. Would he need a cold shower after meeting her? Somehow she doubted it. She guessed she was more of a wasp he’d like to swat than a beautiful butterfly he’d like to do other things with. Sex radiated from him. Even clothed in what had to be the most expensive tailoring known to man, there was something primal about him—something dark and hidden at his core—an animal energy that suggested he would consider any woman fair game.

But not this woman.

Because she had more sense?

It was time to stop daydreaming and get on with making his meal.

* * *

He took an ice-cold shower. His senses had received an unexpected jolt thanks to a most unlikely woman. He smiled grimly as he soaped himself down, imagining the type of chaos she would be creating in Maria’s pristine kitchen round about now. He could only hope she’d washed her hands. He didn’t care for soil in his food.

He shook his head and sent water droplets flying. Stepping out of the shower, he grabbed a towel. He felt refreshed—reinvigorated. Food followed by a few hours of vigorous sex would suit him perfectly, but it would take more than an untried girl to tempt his jaded palate. Pausing by the window, he stared out. His eyes narrowed with interest. Maybe he’d written her off too soon. She was sheathing a knife like a female Indiana Jones, and her capable, no-nonsense manner fired his senses.

* * *

She beat the living daylight out of the eggs. She had to do something to calm herself down before Genghis Khan arrived. It didn’t help that all sorts of wicked thoughts were parading through her head—some including a spatula and a pair of iron-hard buttocks.

What was wrong with her?

She cleaned off the egg spatter from the wall, only for her thoughts to wander off in a new direction—to the day when she had made her first omelette. She’d been six years old and hungry. She knew now that the eggs needed watching or they’d catch and become bitter and inedible. Her first omelette had been black but she’d eaten it. She’d been hungry enough to eat the pan as well. She’d seen enough domestic disruption to last her a lifetime, and had her godmother to thank for knowing her way around a kitchen now. Anyone as sensible and good-humoured as Cass could learn to cook, her godmother had insisted when Cass had expressed doubts.

Cass had lost confidence when her parents’ lives had descended into drug-fuelled chaos, but her godmother had rebuilt her brick by brick; cooking and gardening, nurturing and caring, providing the cure. These activities that were at the root of everything good, her godmother had explained, and the rewards were not only plentiful but you could eat them as well.

That had been the start of Cass finding pleasure in watching things grow. And that was why she knew she could deal with Marco di Fivizzano. Nothing he could throw at her could compare with Cass’s life before she’d lived with her godmother. There were no whirlwinds in her life now, only well-ordered certainty, and that was how it was going to stay.

Tipping out a perfectly cooked omelette, she put the plate on a tray with a bowl of freshly picked salad, timing her delivery to perfection as he walked through the door.

CHAPTER TWO

IN SPITE OF his determination to treat her like any other member of staff, the sight of Cassandra Rich leaning over the kitchen sink as she scrubbed a pan thrust his basest of needs into overdrive. The swell of her hips was so perfectly displayed, though, disappointingly, she had changed her clothes—the ripped and mud-smeared singlet having been replaced by a neatly pressed T-shirt. Though a streak of mud on the side of her neck was just begging to be licked off.

‘I hope you enjoy the omelette,’ she said with apparent sincerity.

He dragged his attention away from one potential feast to glance at the surprisingly appetising meal she had laid out on the table. ‘It looks good,’ he said approvingly, ‘but, where’s the bread?’

He noted the flash of fire in her eyes, more typical of the way she had behaved in the garden, but then she said meekly, ‘I’ll get it for you, sir.’

For some reason her unusually compliant manner annoyed him too.

‘For goodness’ sake, call me Marco.’

He couldn’t be sure if she was mocking him or not, he realised, though his best guess was yes, and blood pounded through his veins as he accepted the challenge.

‘It’s only a simple meal,’ she explained as he grunted his thanks and sat down.

Her attempt to take out her frustration on the eggs had failed completely, Cass concluded. On second viewing, Marco di Fivizzano was even more improbably attractive than the first time she had seen him. Glancing down to make sure her top wasn’t clinging to her breasts, she found her nipples were practically saluting him. In a tailor-made suit, garnished with a crisp white shirt and grey silk tie, her boss had been staggeringly attractive, but in snug-fitting jeans—she had unavoidably scanned his outline beneath them—together with a tight-fitting black top that revealed his banded muscle in more than enough detail he was an incredible sight—

‘Bread?’ he reminded her sharply.

He was also the rudest man she’d ever met.

She hacked at the bread with a vicious stab. The large, country kitchen seemed to be closing around her—no wonder with his arrogant animal magnetism taking up all the space.

‘Have you eaten yet, Cassandra?’

She was surprised by the question but had no intention of sitting down to eat with him.

‘I’m not hungry.’ She was always hungry after working in the open air. ‘I’ll have something later.’

‘See that you do,’ he said, laying down his cutlery. ‘You’re far too thin.’

Apart from the fact that she had never once been called thin—she loved her food, and wasn’t prepared to sacrifice a tasty meal for the sake of wearing jeans a size smaller—he was completely out of order, making personal comments like that.

You love this job—remember?

Heaving a calming breath, she held her tongue.

The girl kept his attention, and though she wasn’t pristine, as he expected his women in Rome to be—even after cleaning herself up she had mud on her neck and more smears on her arms—at least she wasn’t a simpering fool. Neither could she be grouped with the career women with whom he sometimes had a mutually satisfactory arrangement. Cassandra was unique—and not everything on his Tuscan estate was pristine, he reminded himself. He had always thought his estate better for its quirkiness.

‘You’re enjoying the omelette?’ she guessed as he forked up the last mouthful.

‘Very much,’ he admitted.

He hadn’t realised how hungry he was until he’d sat down to eat—or how different this kitchen was from his sleek, steel and black granite, largely untouched kitchen in Rome.

And he wouldn’t change a thing, he mused as he stared around. His critical stare returned to Cassandra. ‘How did you get this job?’

‘A friend of my godmother’s recommended me—she’s another keen gardener.’

‘Who employed you?’ he asked, frowning.

‘You did— I mean your...’ Cass was stumped. Her knowledge of office hierarchy was non-existent.

‘My PA?’ he offered. ‘She’s the only one with the authority to hire my personal staff.’

‘Must have been,’ Cass agreed. She didn’t have a clue what she was talking about. One piercing stare from those compelling eyes and her mind had been wiped clean.

‘I haven’t seen your CV yet,’ he pressed, holding her pinned in his stare. ‘What are your qualifications for this job?’

She had none, other than her passion for the plants she nurtured and the earth she turned. ‘I’m self-taught,’ she admitted. Her knowledge came largely from gardening books and, of course, her favourite book, The Secret Garden.

‘And your previous job?’

She watched Marco—as she must somehow learn to think of him—push his plate away before she spoke. ‘I worked the tills in my local supermarket—when I wasn’t stacking shelves.’

‘Education?’ he prompted, the furrows on his brow deepening.

The derision directed at her by the teachers at her very expensive school had led Cass to contribute little in class, and even less when she’d sat down to take an examination. She didn’t have a clutch of brilliant exam results to crow about.

‘I have no formal qualifications,’ she admitted, upping the tempo on her dish-clearing technique in the hope of avoiding more uncomfortable questions.

She assumed that he hadn’t made the connection between the scandal of her parents’ death and her surname—not yet. And why should she tell him anything more, when he revealed nothing about himself? She could understand that having his idyll trespassed on by a stranger must be an irritation for him, but a powerful, wealthy man like Marco di Fivizzano only had to make a phone call to find out everything about her. Let him do that, if he was so interested.

Calm down, she cautioned herself.

It was all very well telling herself to calm down, but she could just imagine what a man like Marco di Fivizzano would make of her past. The media had gone to town on the story of a small child wandering about in a house full of drug paraphernalia while her parents had floated dead in the swimming pool. If he knew that, then, just like everyone else, he’d make the assumption that she was tainted, when nothing could be further from the truth. She only wished she could reach back into the past as an adult to help her parents.

She sprang to attention when he got up from the table. Having him prowl around made her feel vulnerable, but he left the kitchen without a backward glance or a word of thanks.

‘Rude man.’ Staring out of the window, she watched him cross the yard. But he was beautiful. That easy stride...that incredible body.

Her summer had changed irrevocably now Marco di Fivizzano had arrived and only one thing was certain: her fantasies had moved on from The Secret Garden.

* * *

He’d had a lousy night’s sleep.

He’d had no sleep. Why try to dress it up?

Dragging on his jeans, he scowled as he prowled the room. He should have had the house to himself but now she was in a room across the courtyard.

Lust surged in his veins at the thought that Cassandra’s window was directly opposite his. He’d surfed the internet and had found out everything about her. He’d been right to recognise the name. Cassandra was the only child of the notorious rock legend Jackson Rich and his broken doll of a wife, Alexa Monroe.

So why was she working as a gardener? What had happened to all the money? Jackson Rich had been phenomenally successful. Was it possible he’d spent it all? Cassandra didn’t seem to have a penny to scratch her backside with. He could only concluded that Rich’s hangers-on and numerous drug-pushers had spent it for him. He had no sympathy. He’d been forced to fight every step of the way, and had had no one to rely on but himself. Rich must have been swept up in ego and success, making him an easy target. He had probably been happy to put up with the hangers-on if it had meant scoring his next fix.

For now he would give Cassandra the benefit of the doubt. It didn’t follow that she had inherited her parents’ weakness. If she was a yet another gold-digger, she was destined for disappointment. He didn’t have a vacancy for a mud-daubed mistress in Rome. The women in Rome knew how to dress, how to talk, and how to behave—both in bed and out of it. He doubted Cassandra would be interested in acquiring any of those skills—with the possible exception of the last of them, he reflected dryly.

It was time to remind himself that he avoided complications like the plague. His childhood had proved that women couldn’t be trusted, and he’d had no reason to change his mind. Cassandra Rich might be quirky and appealing, but she was no more than that.

* * *

She’d overslept! Catapulting out of bed, Cass gazed around blankly, trying to get her bearings. The simple courtyard room was the same...the house was the same...the scent of blossom coming in through the open window was the same...even the birds carolling in the crisp morning air was reassuringly the same. But everything had changed, because of Marco.

Forget the boss! She should be up and out, and working in the garden by now.

Forget him?

She would forget him, Cass determined—until she threw off the bedclothes, leapt out of bed, and rushed across to the widow, looking for him. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before. Tall, dark strangers with bodies made for sin had never once flown into her life in a sinister black helicopter, demanding that she feed them.

He’d demanded and she’d fed him. Would she handle that situation any better today?

Could anyone handle Marco di Fivizzano?

Opening the shutters, she was just in time to see him stride across the courtyard. He looked better each time she saw him—dangerous and more ruthless, more stand-well-back-unless-you-want-your-fingers-burned, in a really serious way. Especially this morning when, like last night, he’d consigned his city look to history. The men in her fantasies were always rugged and tough, but Marco made her imaginary men seem pathetic. His well-packed jeans and heavy-duty belt added fuel to her already overheated fantasies. There wasn’t a spare inch of flesh on him. In jeans and a chequered shirt with the sleeves rolled back to reveal his powerful forearms, he appeared to be made entirely of hard muscle. And she would have to be made of wood not to wonder what it would be like to be in his bed.

She didn’t have time for this!

Just as well, Cass thought, ducking back behind the window as Marco stared up.

Could he feel her looking at him? Were his animal instincts switched to super-alert this morning? She would have to be more discreet if she stood a chance of keeping this job.

Once she was out of the shower and wrapped in towels, she considered her vast selection of clothes. These amounted to one summer dress, ‘just in case’, a couple of pairs of shorts and half a dozen tops. She’d packed two pairs of jeans and a fleece in case the evenings turned cold...

And why was she taking such trouble over the selection of clothes to garden in?

Any other day and she would have grabbed the first thing to hand—shorts and a clean top. She was working with the soil, not auditioning for the role of the next notch on Marco di Fivizzano’s bedpost.

So what underwear should she choose?

She scanned the unpromising heap.

Something comfortable, obviously! Did it matter, so long as she could work all day and not feel as if she was in danger of splitting her difference?

She chose her biggest knickers and a sports bra that supported her full breasts properly.

Maria and Giuseppe were back, so she dropped in a few casual questions over breakfast. They knew about as much as she did about their boss’s plans for the next few days. Giuseppe mentioned something about a visit to the Fivizzano vineyards to choose some wines for an important party in Rome, but that was the only nugget she managed to glean before she went back to work.

* * *

A few days passed and then a few days more, and she barely caught a glimpse of The Boss. She kept telling herself that this was great—no pressure—but she was always on the lookout for him. She couldn’t help herself. Marco di Fivizzano was a once-in-a-lifetime attraction. She gathered from Maria that he spent a lot of time inspecting his estate. It certainly felt as if she was very much ‘below stairs’, while he was the master of the house, whose daily life was none of her business. There was no common ground between them, no reason for them to meet—but she could dream, Cass consoled herself ruefully as she collected up her tools to go to work.

Dreams were free, and dreams were safe—or they were until Marco emerged from the house. He only had to glance her way for her heart to go crazy. He was formally dressed and had brought up the Lamborghini.

Was he going out on a date?

And why should she care?

Because smart chinos and an ice-blue shirt pointed up his pirate tan?

Lame.

But he’d teamed them with a casual, beautifully tailored taupe coloured linen jacket, and if she could just see his face...

Nope. He had lowered his sunglasses and his expression was hidden from her.

Good. Did she want him to think she was interested?

She returned to digging the trench she had started to protect her seedlings if the rains came. And those rains would come. Straightening up, she tested the air like a hound on point.

Maria had told her that although the house and estate seemed ageless and indestructible to Cass, it was, in fact, as vulnerable to the elements as any other ancient structure. The path of the river had changed over the centuries and it now presented a danger to the house. Maria had also said that in the fierce storm of 2014 trees had been uprooted and the river had flooded its banks. It was unusually still today...ominously so. Even the birds had stopped singing. She noticed Marco was also glancing at a sky tinged with acid yellow and streaked with angry clouds. She wondered briefly if he’d remembered an umbrella, and then accepted with a grin that men like Marco di Fivizzano never got wet because divine alchemy would ensure that rainclouds blew away from him.

So it fell on poor saps like me, Cass reflected wryly as she thrust her spade vigorously into the moistly yielding earth.

* * *

She was doing it again—driving him crazy with that ripe, mud-streaked body. No other woman had ever come close to affecting him the way she did. He doubted any of them had ever held a spade. They certainly didn’t possess Cassandra’s nonchalance when it came to using her body to the fullest. She was a very physical woman...and complex. How could she be otherwise with her past? He’d read every newspaper article he could find detailing the horrific tragedy. He knew how badly she’d been neglected until her godmother had adopted her. The media had speculated, as he was bound to, on how her parents’ debauched lifestyle might have affected a young girl. His need for caution when it came to women was heading for overdrive where his new young gardener was concerned.

But since when had he been a cautious man?

Gunning the engine of his Lamborghini, he glanced across the garden to where Cassandra was swinging her spade. Her top looked as if it had shrunk in the wash and revealed inches of taut, tanned belly. He imagined dropping kisses on that smooth, silky skin and then working his way down—or up. Either way would be a pleasure for him.

He powered out of the gates, trying to distract himself from thoughts of Cassandra by thinking about all the other women he could have—maybe should have—brought along to entertain him while he was in Tuscany. Women were always eager to share his Tuscan bed, because they knew it was his private retreat, which gave it added mystery. He could think of several cute women who made him laugh—until he tired of their endless quips. There were clever women who challenged him—and gave him earache, he remembered, and beautiful women who could capture his attention and hold it for a night, but no longer. They all wanted the same thing—that his power would rub off on them, and, after that, money and sex. He had even identified a few women who would make ideal wives, but he doubted they could dig a trench, let alone turn that horticultural activity into a pornographic work of art.

Casandra’s bare limbs gleamed with effort as they would after sex, and his groin tightened at he watched her thrusting her spade into the soil. She was giving it everything she’d got, as he imagined she would in bed.

* * *

Why was Marco staring at her? Cass wondered as he sped away in a storm of dust and gravel.

Why was she staring at him?

He was probably just checking she was doing her work, she reasoned sensibly. And she wouldn’t look at him ever again.

That was what you said the last time.

But she meant it this time.

Did she? Marco only had to look at her for lust to stab clean through her.

That was her imagination working overtime—hopefully—she concluded as Marco’s bright red Lamborghini powered away down the road. Lots of perfectly decent women lusted after the most inappropriate men, and in most cases nothing came of it—and if it did in this case, she’d run a mile. Marco di Fivizzano was one fantasy too far, she told herself sternly as his car roared away to the accompaniment of a low roll of thunder.

CHAPTER THREE

MYSTERY SOLVED. MARCO HAD gone to have lunch with the mayor. Should she feel quite so relieved when Maria told her this? Was she jealous?

Crazy girl! Get back out in the garden where things made sense!

Brushing her hair out of her eyes, she rammed on her cap after offering to clear up, so Maria and Giuseppe could get straight off to the fiesta in town.

‘Don’t get caught in the rain.’ She glanced up at the darkening sky.

She waved off her friends and then contemplated the happy state of having the whole afternoon to work uninterrupted in the garden. The happy state didn’t last very long. She should have listened to her own advice, Cass concluded as a flash of lightning stabbed the ground just a few feet away from her. It wasn’t safe to be outdoors, but there was plenty she could do to help Maria in the kitchen.

It had quickly turned dark, and the air was as heavy as if nature was stuck in a cupboard with a headache. As the first fat spots of rain hit her in the face she collected up her tools and beat a hasty retreat. Making a dash for the kitchen door, she launched herself through it, already soaked through. There would just be time to check the windows were closed before the storm hit full force.

She raced up stairs, by which time the storm had arrived. It was like all the fiends of hell roaring around the house, testing its defences. Slapping her hands over her ears as a thunderclap shocked her out of her skin, she shrieked with alarm as lightning flashed repeatedly, and did a little dance on the spot to reassure herself that the house was still standing.

Pull yourself together! Things need to be done.

She switched on the lights and felt better immediately, but on her way downstairs they all went out again. Now the power was down. She huddled against a door in the dark, and then told herself to get over it. Finding a light switch, she flicked it on and off, more in hope than expectation. It was dead. She reached for her phone. The line was dead too. There was a house phone on the landing—

Dead.

Feeling her way carefully down the stairs, she screamed as she stepped into icy-cold water. Leaping back onto the stairs, she clung to the banister like a limpet, trying to think what to do. She told herself calmly that the house had stood for centuries, and Marco had renovated it to the nth degree, so even if the river had changed its course, the house was hardly likely to leave its foundations and float away. She was safe, and she was confident that any damage could be dealt with. If there had been similar storms in the past, Marco would have prepared for bad weather. And if the river had flooded its banks and the road from the village was closed, she was cut off, so it was up to her to sort it out.

* * *

As day turned into night in the middle of the afternoon, everyone knew that a really bad storm was coming. Making his excuses, Marco left the mayoral reception early, and as he jogged down the steps he noticed that even the stallholders were packing up. They had all sensed the drama in the skies, and the bad weather was sweeping in much faster than expected. Some said it might be as bad as the explosive weather conditions of 2014, and with that in mind he’d called Maria and Giuseppe to warn them to stay in town. It was then they told him that Signorina Rich had never had any intention of joining them at the fiesta.

She was still at the house. And in who knew what sort of danger?

Cassandra Rich was an irritation he didn’t need. Was anything straightforward where that woman was concerned? Any other woman he knew would have been drawn like a magpie to the stalls on the market, but not Cassandra. Oh, no. She had to be the one member of his staff left unaccounted for as the storm of the century approached. If the river flooded, the authorities would close the bridge and then he wouldn’t get home. There were sandbags lined up outside the kitchen door, if she had the wit to use them, and an emergency generator in case the power went off.

The power would go off, he predicted, glancing again at the sky. Ribbons of lightning were slicing the boiling clouds into ugly black fragments, to a soundscape of earth-shattering thunderclaps. Then, quite suddenly, the noise subsided and it went ominously still.

Just as suddenly, rain started falling in vicious, freezing rods. Jumping into his car, he knew there wasn’t a moment to lose if he was going to get across the bridge before the emergency services closed the road.

His was the last car through. Men in uniform warned him to turn back. He thanked them and then ignored them. How he longed for his rugged pick-up. He grimaced at the sound of metal crunching as he rode a bank to avoid a fallen tree. He’d almost certainly wreck the engine and the brakes. Water was rising up the wheels, and the wipers couldn’t work fast enough to clear the windscreen.

He pressed on with one thought driving him. Cassandra was alone in the dark, stranded on his estate, and whether or not that was thanks to her own stubbornness, she was a member of his staff and he had a duty of care towards her. He could only imagine her relief when he arrived to save the day.

He had never been so pleased to see the house. He was less pleased to discover that floodwater was lapping around the front step. Parking up, he waded to the front door. Inserting his key, he pushed, but the door wouldn’t open. He put his shoulder to it, but that made no difference. The house was in darkness. He glanced across the courtyard and called out. There was no sign of life. Where was she?

‘Cassandra!’

Framing his face with his hands, he peered into one of the windows, but all he could see was blackness beyond. Turning up his collar, he retraced his steps. It brought him a moment’s humour to see the ground might be flooded but Cassandra’s trench was doing its job in directing the water safely away from her seedlings. He skidded to a halt at the back door. It was wide open. His heart jumped at the thought she might have run out into the night; people had died in similar weather conditions.

‘Are you just going to stand there, or are you going to help me?’

He spun around at the sound of her voice. Moonlight framed her. She was at the far end of the kitchen soaked to the skin, with her hair hanging in straggles down her back as she dragged a sandbag across the floor.

‘Those candles have gone out again,’ she shouted as she backed into the hall. ‘Can you close the door and light them for me?’

‘Leave that!’ He swore viciously as he tore off his jacket. He was at her side in an instant. ‘You light the candles. I’ll take the sandbag.’

She shook him off. The brief contact between them was electrifying.

‘If you want to help me, grab another bag!’ she yelled. ‘The river must have burst its banks—’

‘Clearly,’ he said dryly, wrestling the sandbag from her grasp. He laid it down on top of the others. That was why he’d been unable to get in—and now she was rolling up his Persian carpets.

‘Help me,’ she insisted impatiently. ‘It will be faster if the two of us do it.’

‘Have you lit those candles yet?’ he pressed, frowning.

‘Have you got any manners?’ she fired back with a scowl twice as deep as his.

He straightened up with surprise. No one had ever talked to him this way before.

‘Thank you would be a start,’ she told him sharply.

An almighty thunder crash brought an end to their discussion. As lightning flashed repeatedly he could see the wide-eyed shock on her face.

‘You’re safe,’ he insisted, when nature paused to take a breath.

‘If it doesn’t stop raining soon, we’ll be sunk—quite literally,’ she said. ‘Here—catch this.’

She tossed him a towel to mop up the water leaking through her barricade. Far from cowering in a corner, waiting for her white knight to arrive, Signorina Rich was firmly in control. He surprised himself by liking that. But, then, he liked her. He couldn’t help himself. He admired her grit.

‘Well? Are you going to help me to roll up these rugs or not?’ she demanded, glancing back at him as she lit the candles on the hall table.

There were plenty of things he would like to help Signorina Rich with, and rolling rugs wasn’t at the top of his list.

It was all going well for her until she crossed the room in the half-light and caught her foot under a rug. As she stumbled he caught her close. It only took an instant to absorb how good she felt beneath his hands. Candlelight mapped the changes in her eyes from blue to black. She held her breath, almost as if she thought he was going to kiss her. Would she fight him? Would she yield hungrily? It was irrelevant to him. He might want to kiss her, he might even ache to kiss her, but he would never be so self-indulgent.

Delay was the servant of pleasure, he mused dryly as he steadied her.

‘Be careful you don’t trip up again.’

The look she gave him suggested that tripping up over a rug, or anything else for that matter, was the last thing on her mind.

‘Shall we carry on?’ she suggested. ‘The rugs?’ she added pointedly.

She got more brownie points for effort, and his senses got a second jolt when she brushed past him. She’d keep, he reassured his aching flesh. She wasn’t going anywhere.

Having been forced to work together, Cass was surprised to discover how well they could read each other’s intentions—to her surprise, they made a great team. It was certainly a pleasure watching Marco wielding his immense physical strength.

‘I’ll move things out of the way so you can take that rug into the dining room,’ she told him, holding her breath as Marco shouldered the weight of the wool rug as if it were a bag of feathers. Opening the door wide, she cleared a space for him, only to find him breathing down her neck. Their hands brushed. Their bodies touched. Their breath mingled as he turned around. They were just too dangerously close—

‘Great job,’ she said, stepping back. Now she realised that in her hurry to get away from him she had made it sound as if their positions in life had been reversed and Marco was her assistant. Oh, well. There was nothing she could do about that now. Ducking beneath his arm, she slipped away.

‘Where are you going?’ he demanded.

‘To my bed.’ She turned and shrugged. ‘We’ve done all we can tonight. I’m going to have a bath first—try to warm up. The power may be off but the water should still be warm in the reserve tank—and I promise I won’t use it all.’

‘A bath in the dark?’ he queried.

‘I’ll manage—I’ll take some candles.’ She glanced at his fist on the door. Was he going to try and stop her leaving? The tension between them had suddenly roared off the scale.

‘You’re in a hurry to get away.’

His murmur hit her straight between the shoulder blades in a deliciously dangerous quiver of awareness. ‘I’m cold,’ she excused herself, hugging her body and acting fragile. She doubted he was convinced, but at least he lifted his hand from the door.

‘You’ve done well tonight,’ he said as he stood back.

‘And now I’m freezing,’ she reminded him in a stronger voice. That wasn’t so far from the truth. She was soaking wet. ‘If you could get the power back on...’ she suggested hopefully.

Marco narrowed his eyes and looked at her. ‘You’d better take that bath,’ he said, to her relief. ‘And don’t forget to reassure your godmother that you’re safe. A storm like this will have made the international news. And anyone else, of course, who might be interested,’ he added as an apparent afterthought.

He didn’t fool her. ‘There is no one else.’ She guessed that was his real question. ‘And I will speak to my godmother as soon as the phone line comes back.’

‘You obviously think a lot of her.’

Passion and gratitude swept over her. ‘My godmother is the most wonderful woman on earth. She took me in—’

‘When your parents were killed,’ Marco supplied thoughtfully.

‘Yes.’ She firmed her lips, reluctant to say anything more. How much did he know?

‘Why did you leave her to come here to work in Tuscany?’

‘It’s a great job,’ she said frankly. ‘And I can’t just live off her. She found this opportunity for me when I left my last job. She found it through one of her friends, another keen gardener. It would have been churlish of me to turn it down.’

Though maybe she should have done, Cass reflected as Marco continued to stare at her. He was beginning to make her nervous. She decided to give him a little more. ‘I can easily get a job at another supermarket when I go home, and in the meantime this job is perfect for me.’

‘Perfect,’ Marco echoed without comment or expression.

He might want to know more, but she wasn’t going to discuss her personal life with someone who was practically a stranger.

‘Don’t catch cold,’ he reminded her.

She didn’t need another prompt. She left him and ran across the courtyard without a backward glance. Racing up the steps to her room, she felt as if the devil was on her back.

* * *

He stood in silence when Cassandra left him. She had handled the crisis with impressive calm and now she intrigued him more than ever. Apparently uncomplicated and open, she was, in fact, as much a closed book as he was. He would like to find out more about her. She was hopeless at taking orders, but she was a breath of fresh air. Having worked closely with her, he now felt the lack of her, like a caged lion, penned in with a woman he wanted in his bed. He would be ill-advised to seduce her, he reminded himself firmly. He never slept with his employees.

He eased the physical ache with practicalities, starting up the generator and checking the garden to assess the damage. He huffed dryly to see her seedlings had survived when trees that had stood for centuries were lying broken on the ground. He should give her a long-term contract just to build drainage channels for him.

Having checked the sandbags were doing their job, he marvelled that she could lift them at all. He was trying to exhaust himself, he realised, in an attempt to put Cassandra out of his mind. That didn’t stop his body craving her, or his mind from examining every tiny detail he knew about her. Cassandra Rich was the most unsettling woman he’d ever met. She was everything he would usually avoid. She was too young, too naïve, and she had no inkling of their relative positions in life—which was something else he liked about her, he now discovered. There were far too many toadies in his world. Cassandra Rich was real, he concluded with a shrug. If he were stranded in another storm, would he want Cassandra at his side or one of those fragrant types he usually went for? He’d choose Cassandra every time.

He laughed as he jogged up the stairs. There were so few surprises left in life, he almost welcomed her arrival into his remote, complex world.

So few surprises?

He was about to get the surprise of his life. He stopped dead on the threshold of his room. His window was closed, but his shutters were open and Cassandra’s light was on.

* * *

She would never know what made her do it, other than to say she had seen pictures in magazines and films, as well as images in her head, of the type of sophisticated temptress a man like Marco would most likely be attracted to. That woman would be a minx, a siren, a temptress—all the things that capable Cass, as they had called her at the supermarket, most certainly wasn’t. But there was nothing to stop her playing out her fantasy.

Perhaps it was the warmth of the evening and having a man like Marco close by and yet at a safe distance that had made exploring her own sexuality not just irresistible but an imperative. She’d missed having fun, but Tuscany seemed to have released something in her.

Working side by side with Marco had certainly released something in her, Cass reflected mischievously—and that was her excuse for dancing around the room while she waited for her bath to fill. In her dreams, she was dancing for him—and Marco was drooling, of course.

In reality, he wouldn’t want his gardener, but what fun were bare facts? Her job here would end soon and he would be out of her life, but for now...let the dream continue!

Taking a breather, she went to peer out of the window. Marco’s lights were safely off and his room was empty. Thank goodness! For a moment she had felt a rush of concern, wondering if he was watching her from the shadows. But no. It was just her and the moonlight, and she was safe to continue with part two of the show, dancing on her imaginary stage, beneath the moon, her imaginary spotlight...

* * *

He stood transfixed as Cassandra started to undress. She had her back to him, and was performing a slow and rather skilful striptease. When the top came over her head and he caught a glimpse of the ripe swell of her breasts, he was disappointed that the angle at which she was standing prevented him from seeing more. His imagination lost no time supplying the detail, and he groaned at the prospect of another night without sleep.

Allowing her top to drop to the floor, she removed the band from her ponytail and let her hair flow free in a shimmering cascade down her back. Running her fingers through it, she shivered a little as it fell around her shoulders, as if the touch of her hair on her naked skin aroused her. Still moving with a tantalising lack of haste, she freed the fastening at the waistband of her jeans, and reaching her hands behind her back she slipped her fingers beneath the denim, pushing it down over the swell of her hips. When she arched her back, it was almost as if she was presenting her buttocks for his approval. He did approve.

He went still as she stepped out of the jeans. Many women had tried to seduce him, and a good few had succeeded, but no one had made him feel as hungry as this. He was transfixed by the sight of Cassandra running her fingertips lightly over her breasts, her hands lingering, as if she appreciated the pertness of her nipples as much as he did. His senses roared as she pinched them. She appeared to cry out softly at the pain. Rolling her head back, she cupped her breasts and drew them forward as if inviting him to suckle. He would go mad if this went on for much longer.

He tensed as her hands travelled down over the swell of her belly. She had reached another place he would like to take his time exploring. She traced the swell lightly with her fingertips before delving deeper, and when she withdrew her hand he sucked in a noisy breath, only to realise that for the past few seconds he hadn’t breathed at all. Cassandra had seemed so innocent, and yet these were the actions of a very sensual woman, who knew exactly how to torment a man. For all her physical strength and forthright manner, Cassandra was as lush and womanly as he could wish for. And, in the biggest surprise of the night, she had turned out to be the most erotically provocative female he’d ever met. He wondered if her pleasure was always self-administered. Her right arm was undulating lazily. Was she touching herself intimately? He had never been so aroused by the sight of a woman doing that. He was in agony.

* * *

What was she doing? Cass asked herself in shock, bringing a sudden halt to her performance.

She should be curled up safely in bed. She could only put her behaviour down to a release of tension now the storm had passed, and the old house she was coming to love had survived, because this was way over the top, and she had to stop doing it right now.

Had she lost her mind completely? She hadn’t even closed the windows—

Grabbing the towel she’d laid ready for her bath, she secured it around her body, and then turned around to check that she hadn’t been seen.

Marco’s shutters were firmly closed, thank goodness.

Closed? Had they been closed before?

She couldn’t remember. She could only remember thinking that his room had been in darkness. Maybe they had been closed. They must have been closed, she reassured herself sensibly.