Excerpt

‘I swore I would one day make you pay for what you did to me, Ava, and that day has come,’ he said. ‘This villa is mine and everything in it—including you.’

She swallowed convulsively as she tried to pull out of his hold. ‘No…No!’

His fingers bit into her flesh. ‘Yes and yes, ma belle,’ he said. ‘Do you not want to hear my terms?’

Ava fought for control of her emotions. She bit the inside of her lip, tasting blood and the bitterness of regret. ‘Go on, then,’ she said, dropping her shoulders slightly.

His fingers relaxed their hold, his thumb moving in a slow caress over the pillow of her bottom lip until every nerve-end was tingling. Ava was mesmerised by his touch. It was so achingly gentle after his flaying words. She felt herself melting, the stiffness going out of her limbs, her body remembering how it felt to press up against his hard, protective warmth.

After a moment he seemed to check himself. His hand dropped from her mouth and his eyes hardened to black coal again. ‘You will be my mistress,’ he said. ‘I will pay you an allowance for as long as we are together. But I would like to make one thing very clear from the outset. Unlike the way you manipulated Cole into marrying you, I will not be offering the same deal. There will be no marriage between us. Ever.’

Melanie Milburne says: ‘One of the greatest joys of being a writer is the process of falling in love with the characters and then watching as they fall in love with each other. I am an absolutely hopeless romantic. I fell in love with my husband on our second date, and we even had a secret engagement, so you see it must have been destined for me to be a Harlequin Mills & Boon® author! The other great joy of being a romance writer is hearing from readers. You can hear all about the other things I do when I’m not writing, and even drop me a line, at: www.melaniemilburne.com.au’

Castellano’s Mistress of Revenge

By

Melanie Milburne

MILLS & BOON®

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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To my beautiful friend Louise Gordon. You are such a giving soul, so gentle and understanding and so non-judgemental. You have supported me through some very dark times and I dedicate this book to you in honour of our friendship.

Chapter One

‘OF COURSE, Madame Cole, you get to keep the jewellery and any other personal gifts Mr Cole gave to you during your marriage,’ the lawyer said as he closed the thick document folder in front of him. ‘But the Monte Carlo villa and the yacht, as well as Mr Cole’s entire business portfolio, now belong to Signor Marcelo Castellano.’

Ava sat very still and composed in her chair. She had trained herself over the years to keep her emotions under strict control. No flicker of fear showed in her eyes, and no tremble of her neatly manicured hands as they lay elegantly on her lap betrayed her. But, deep inside her chest, her heart felt as if a large hand had closed over it and begun to squeeze it with a brutal strength. ‘I understand,’ she said in a coolly detached tone. ‘I am in the process of making arrangements for my things to be moved from the villa as soon as possible.’

‘Signor Castellano has insisted you do not leave the villa until he meets with you there,’ the lawyer said. ‘Apparently there are things he wishes to discuss with you to do with the handover of the property.’

This time it was almost impossible to control the widening of her eyes as she looked across the wide desk at Monsieur Letourneur. ‘I am sure the household staff will be perfectly capable of giving him a guided tour,’ she said, tying her hands together to stop them from fidgeting with her bag.

‘Nevertheless he insisted on seeing you in person, at 8:00 p.m. this evening,’ Monsieur Letourneur said. ‘I believe he wants to move in immediately.’

Ava stared at the lawyer, her heart starting to flap in panic. ‘Is that legal?’ she asked. ‘The short-term lease on an apartment I had lined up fell through and I haven’t had time to search for an alternative. There’s been so much to do and I—’

‘It is perfectly legal,’ Monsieur Letourneur said with a hint of impatience. ‘He has owned the villa for several months now, even before your husband passed away. In any case, a letter was sent to you a few weeks ago to inform you of Signor Castellano’s intention to take possession.’

Ava felt her insides turn somersaults, not smoothly executed ones, but jerky and uncoordinated tumbles that left her feeling dizzy. She stared at the lawyer, unable to speak, barely able to think. What was she to do? Where was she to go at such short notice? She had money in her account, but certainly not enough to pay for a hotel for days, perhaps even weeks on end whilst searching for a place to live.

Right from the start Douglas had insisted on everything being in his name. That had been part of the deal he had made when insisting she become his wife. Then upon his death there had been so many expenses with the funeral and the outstanding bills he had left unattended to in the last stages of his illness.

‘But I received no such letter!’ she finally said when she could get her thoughts into some sort of working order. ‘Are you sure one was sent?’

The lawyer opened the file in front of him and passed her a copy of a computer-written letter which confirmed her worst nightmare. Somehow the letter must have gone astray, for she had never received it. She stared at the words printed there, unable to believe this was happening to her.

‘I believe you have a history with Signor Castellano, oui?’ The lawyer’s voice jolted her out of her anguished rumination.

‘Oui, monsieur,’ she said with a frown still pulling at her brow. ‘Five years ago…’ she swallowed tightly ‘…in London.’

‘I am sorry things did not work out better for you, Madame Cole,’ the lawyer said. ‘Mr Cole’s wishes were for you to be well provided for, but the global financial crisis hit him very hard, as indeed it did many investors and business people. It was fortunate Signor Castellano agreed to cover the remaining debts as part of the takeover package.’

Ava’s stomach suddenly dropped like a faulty elevator. ‘D-debts?’ The word came out of her parched mouth like a ghostly whisper. ‘But I thought everything had been seen to. Douglas assured me everything was sorted out, that there would be nothing to worry about.’ Even as she said the words she realised how stupid and naïve she sounded. She sounded exactly like the empty-headed trophy wife the Press had always made her out to be. But then didn’t she deserve the slight? After all, she had been a naïve fool to take Douglas at his word five years ago, only to find out within hours of marrying him his word was not to be trusted.

Monsieur Letourneur looked at her gravely. ‘Perhaps he did not wish to distress you with how bad things were towards the end. But let me tell you, without Signor Castellano’s generous offer you would be in very deep water indeed. Every financial institution in the world is jumpy these days. Margin calls are happening almost daily. Signor Castellano has agreed to cover all future requests for payment.’

Ava quickly ran the tip of her tongue across what remained of her lip gloss, tasting a sweet and sour cocktail of strawberries and fear. ‘That seems rather generous of him,’ she said, keeping her shoulders straight and her spine even straighter.

‘Yes, but then he is one of the richest men in Europe,’ the lawyer said. ‘His construction company has grown phenomenally over the last few years. He has branches all over the world, even in your country of birth, I understand. Do you intend to return to Australia now?’

Ava thought longingly of returning to her land of birth, but with her younger sister now married and based in London, she felt it was too far to relocate, especially now. Serena wasn’t back on her feet after suffering from a devastating miscarriage after yet another failed IVF attempt. Ava had not long returned from visiting Serena and had promised to come back as soon as she could to help her through such a harrowing time. But going there now was out of the question. Serena would immediately sense something was up and it would not do her recovery any good to find out about the mess Ava was in. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I have a friend I would like to visit in Scotland. I thought I might try and find a job while I am there.’

Ava could see the cynicism in the lawyer’s eyes as he got to his feet. She supposed from his perspective she deserved it; after all, she had to all intents and purposes been a kept woman for the last five years. No doubt he thought finding a regular job with the sort of perks she had been used to was not going to be easy.

Ava was well aware of the precarious position she was in. It wasn’t going to be easy, but she needed a regular flow of income to help her sister have the baby she so desperately wanted. Her husband, Richard Holt, earned a reasonable income as an academic, but nowhere near enough to cover the expense of repeated IVF treatments.

Ava glanced at her watch as she left the lawyer’s building. She had less than three hours until she saw Marc Castellano for the first time in five years. Her stomach fluttered with feathered wings of fear as her footsteps click-clacked along the pavement.

Fear, or was it excitement?

It was perhaps a perverse bit of both, Ava acceded. She had more or less been expecting him to contact her. She knew he would relish in the opportunity to gloat over the way things had turned out for her. The news of Douglas’s death six weeks ago had gone around the world. Why Marc had waited this long to see her she supposed was all part of his plan to make the most of her very public fall.

The villa was cool after the heat of the summer sun and she released her sticky hair from the back of her collar, rolling her neck and shoulders to try and ease some of the tension that had gathered there.

The housekeeper, an older French woman called Celeste, came towards her from the main reception room at the foot of the grand staircase. ‘Excusez-moi, madame, mais vous avez un visiteur,’ she said and, changing to English, continued, ‘Signor Marcelo Castellano. He said you were expecting him.’

Ava felt a scuttle-like sensation pass across her scalp, like tiny panicked feet tripping through her hair. ‘Merci, Celeste,’ she said, placing her bag on the nearest surface with a hand that was almost but not quite steady, ‘but I was led to understand he was coming much later.’

The housekeeper raised her hands in a what-would-I-know? gesture. ‘He is here now, in there.’ She pointed to the formal reception room that overlooked the gardens and the port and sea beyond.

Ava set her mouth, although her heart gave another flip-flop-like beat. ‘You can leave now,’ she said. ‘I will see you in the morning. Bonsoir.’

The housekeeper gave a respectful nod of her salt-and-pepper head and backed away. Ava drew in a breath, held it for a beat or two before releasing it in a jagged stream.

The door of the reception room was closed, but she could sense Marc standing the other side of it. He wouldn’t be sitting. He wouldn’t be pacing impatiently either. He would be standing.

Waiting.

For her.

Putting one high-heeled foot in front of the other, Ava moved to the door and, opening it, walked into the room.

The first thing she noticed was his smell: citrus and sharp with an undertone of masculine body heat, it played about her nostrils, teasing them into an involuntary flare.

The next thing she noticed was his eyes. They locked on hers within a heartbeat, deep and dark as blackened coal, inscrutable and yet dangerously sexy. Fringed with thick black lashes beneath equally dark brows, his gaze was both intelligent and astute and intensely, unmistakably male. After holding hers for what seemed an eternity, his gaze then went on to sweep over her lazily, leaving a trail of blistering heat in its wake. Flames erupted beneath her skin, licking along her veins, lighting a fire of need deep and low inside her that she had thought had long ago turned to ashes.

He was wearing a dark charcoal-grey finely pinstriped suit, which showcased the breadth of his shoulders and the taut leanness of his frame. His ink-black hair was longer than he had worn it in the past, but Ava thought the slightly tousled just-out-of-bed look suited him perfectly. His crisply white shirt and silverembossed tie emphasised his olive skin, the shiny cufflinks at his strongly boned wrists a touch of class that reminded her of how incredibly successful he had become over the last five years.

‘So, we finally meet again,’ Marc said in that deep, husky male tone that had always made her spine feel watery and unstable. ‘I am sorry I didn’t make it to the funeral or send you a card with my condolences.’ He gave a small movement of his lips which belied the sincerity of his statement. ‘Under the circumstances I didn’t think either would be appropriate.’

Ava pulled her shoulders back to counteract his effect on her. ‘I suppose you are only here now to gloat over your prize,’ she said with an attempt at haughtiness.

His dark eyes glittered meaningfully. ‘That depends on which prize you are referring to, ma petite.’

Ava felt her skin burn as his eyes ran over her again. It had always made her heart skip when he used French endearments in that sexy Italian accent of his.

She wondered if he knew how much it hurt to see him again. Not just emotionally, but physically. It was like an ache deep in her bones; they creaked with the memory of him holding her, kissing her, making her body explode with passion time and time again. She felt the sharp twinge of response even now by being in the same room as him. It was like strings being tugged deep inside of her, reminding her of all the heat and fire of his desire for her, and hers for him.

She had hoped he would have stopped hating her by now, but she could see the fire of it in his eyes, she could even feel it in the stance of his six-foot-four frame, the tension in his sculptured muscles, and the clenching and unclenching of his long-fingered hands as if he didn’t trust himself not to reach out and shake her for how she had betrayed him. If only he knew the truth, but how could she explain it now, after all this time?

Ava raised her chin with a bravado she was nowhere near feeling. ‘Let’s not speak in riddles, Marc. Say what you came here to say.’

He stepped closer. It was only one step, but it halted the breath in her throat. She swallowed, but it only made the restriction tighter. She had to crane her neck, for even in her heels he towered over her. His eyes bored into hers, dark and deep pools of simmering anger.

‘I am here to take possession of this villa,’ he said, ‘and to offer you a job for which we both know you are highly qualified.’

She frowned at him, her stomach curdling with unease, her skin tightening all over with apprehension. ‘D-doing what?’

His top lip lifted, his eyes glittering with icy disdain. ‘Servicing a rich man’s needs. You are well known for it, are you not?’

Ava felt a tremor in her spine as his hatred smashed over her in soundless waves. ‘You know nothing of my relationship with Douglas,’ she said, trying to keep her voice steady and controlled.

‘Your meal ticket is dead,’ Marc said bluntly. ‘He’s left you with nothing, not even a roof over your beautiful blonde head.’

‘Only because you took it all off him,’ she shot back. ‘You did it deliberately, didn’t you? There were hundreds if not thousands of companies going for the asking, but you hunted him down and took everything off him to get at me.’

He smiled a victor’s smile, but there was a hint of cruelty about it. ‘I will give you a minute or two to think it over,’ he said. ‘I am sure you will come to see it as the most sensible course of action at this point in your life.’

‘I don’t need even a second to think it over,’Ava said through tight lips. ‘I don’t want your rubbish job.’

A lightning flash of fury lit his gaze from behind. ‘Did your lawyer not explain to you how things are?’

‘I would rather live on the streets than work in any capacity for you,’ she said. ‘I know what you’re trying to do, Marc, but it won’t work. I know you think I deliberately betrayed you, but that’s not the way it was. I knew nothing of Douglas’s business interests. He didn’t tell me he was bidding for the same contract as you.’

His mouth was a thin, flat line of tension. ‘You double-crossing liar,’ he ground out venomously. ‘You did everything in your power to ruin me and you damned near got away with it. I lost nearly everything. Everything, do you hear me?’

Ava closed her eyes in distress. The vibration of his anger in the air was like pummelling blows to her flesh. She could not defend herself against her guilt at what she had inadvertently done to him by marrying Douglas Cole. But given her time again she would still have done it, for Serena’s sake.

‘Open your eyes,’ Marc growled at her.

Her eyes sprang open, the nettle-like sting of tears blurring her vision. ‘Don’t do this, Marc,’ she said, close to pleading. ‘The past can’t be changed by manipulating things now.’

His eyes blazed like twin black bowls of flame as he grasped her chin between two of his fingers, his touch like a blistering brand on her skin. His eyes drilled into hers, holding hers in a duel she could never hope to win. She lowered her lashes, but he countered it by pushing her chin even higher. ‘I swore I would one day make you pay for what you did to me, Ava, and that day has come,’ he said. ‘This villa is mine and everything in it, including you.’

She swallowed convulsively as she tried to pull out of his hold. ‘No…no!’

His fingers bit into her flesh. ‘Yes and yes, ma belle,’ he said. ‘Do you not want to hear my terms?’

Ava fought for control of her emotions. She bit the inside of her lip, tasting blood and the bitterness of regret. ‘Go on, then,’ she said, dropping her shoulders slightly.

His fingers relaxed their hold, his thumb moving in a slow caress over the pillow of her bottom lip until every nerve-end was tingling. Ava was mesmerised by his touch. It was so achingly gentle after his flaying words. She felt herself melting, the stiffness going out of her limbs, her body remembering how it felt to press up against his hard, protective warmth.

After a moment he seemed to check himself. His hand dropped from her mouth and his eyes hardened to black coal again. ‘You will be my mistress,’ he said. ‘I will pay you an allowance for as long as we are together. But I would like to make one thing very clear from the outset. Unlike the way you manipulated Cole into marrying you, I will not be offering the same deal. There will be no marriage between us. Ever.’

Ava felt her heart contract in pain at the bitterness in his tone. He had spoken the words like a business plan. But then, what had changed? Hadn’t he said much the same five years ago? No marriage, no kids, no commitment. And she had been foolish enough to accept it…for a time.

Ava drew in a breath that scalded her throat. ‘You seem very convinced I will accept your offer.’

‘That is because I know you, Ava,’ he said with a sardonic light in his gaze. ‘You need money and a lot of it.’

‘I can find work.’ Pride pulled her shoulders back even farther. ‘I’ve been thinking of returning to modelling.’

A determined look hardened his eyes to black ice. ‘One word from me and there’s not an agency the length and breadth of Europe who would take you on.’

Ava wished she had the courage to call his bluff. But after a five-year hiatus in her modelling career at Douglas’s insistence she didn’t like her chances of being picked up by her old agency, let alone anyone else.

‘I can find other work,’ she said with a defiant look.

‘Not the sort of work that will pay you enough to regularly top up your sister’s bank account.’

Ava felt her eyes widen. ‘You know about that?’

He gave her an enigmatic look. ‘You know the saying—keep your friends close but your enemies closer. I am making it my business to find out everything there is to find out about you, Ava.’

Ava felt as if he had pierced her heart with a long metal skewer. She felt the barb of it right to her backbone; it reverberated throughout her body, making her want to hug her arms around herself, to stop the pulse of pain. But somehow she stood firm, her eyes holding the black fire of his.

‘Please keep Serena out of this,’ she said hollowly.

‘There will be no need for her to know anything other than we are together again,’ he said.

Ava wondered how the news would affect her sister. Serena had out of fierce loyalty never mentioned Marc’s name in her presence over the last five years. She had also kept the secret of Ava’s real relationship with Douglas Cole quiet, so quiet her husband, Richard, was to this day unaware of it. Serena had been too terrified Richard’s conservative family would be totally scandalised by her near-brush with a prison term that only Ava’s actions had rescued her from experiencing.

But returning to Marc on the terms he had outlined was unthinkable to Ava. How would she bear his daily quest for revenge? How could she face that hatred day after day?

She looked up at him again, shocked at how cold and ruthlessly calculating he had become. He had certainly been no angel in the past—yes, he had been strongwilled and proud and had arrogantly insisted on his own way, but he had never been cruel. But what hurt most was that it was her choice to marry Douglas that had brought about the change in him. Of course Marc would think it had been deliberate, but then, unbeknown to her, Douglas had planned it that way.

She twisted her hands, unconsciously fingering the amethyst ring on her finger, a peace offering Douglas had given her during the last months of his illness. ‘I need some time to think about this…’

Marc’s eyes flashed like fast-drawn daggers. ‘You’ve had six weeks.’

Ava blinked at the savage bite of his words. ‘You surely don’t expect me to accept this outrageous offer without some careful consideration, do you?’

His mouth was curled upwards in a sneer. ‘It didn’t take you too long to consider moving on with another man after you walked out on me. Within a month you were living with Cole as his wife.’

‘I am sure you moved on with your life just as quickly,’ she said with a fiery flash of her eyes. ‘In fact you are rarely out of the Press with a starlet on your arm.’

‘I admit I do not live the life of a monk,’ he said, ‘which brings me to another condition of mine on the arrangement.’

‘I haven’t agreed to it yet.’

‘You will.’

Ava ground her teeth at his imperious manner. ‘Let me guess,’ she said, glaring at him resentfully. ‘You want me to be faithful to you while you get to do whatever you like with whomever you like.’

His dark eyes gleamed. ‘You are well trained, I see. Perhaps your time with Cole has finally taught you how to behave.’

She tightened her lips until they went numb, anger bubbling inside her at his assumption of her as a gold-digger. It was so unfair. Why couldn’t he leave the past alone? To come to her now, after all this time, was going to achieve nothing but more heartache for her. It had broken her heart to walk away from him the first time. It had taken every bit of willpower and self-respect to do so. Living as his mistress had been so bittersweet and in the end she had chosen the bitter over the sweet. He had flatly refused to promise her anything but a short-term affair. The concept of marriage was anathema to him; now it seemed more so than ever.

Marc took an envelope out of his jacket pocket and handed it to her. ‘I have drawn up a legal document for you to sign,’ he said. ‘It states how much money I am willing to pay you to cohabit with me. By signing it you will be unable to claim support when our relationship is terminated.’

‘A prenuptial?’ she asked, frowning as her fingers took the envelope from him.

‘Without the nuptials,’ he said, his eyes diamond-hard. ‘No marriage, no children.’

Ava felt her insides twist in pain. Watching her sister go through the agony of not being able to conceive had made her acutely aware of how much she longed to have a baby of her own. To hear Marc state so implacably that he wanted no children struck at the heart of her. She was twenty-seven years old, which was still young enough not to panic, but with her younger sister’s fertility problems she couldn’t quite quell the worry that she too might not be able to conceive naturally.

‘I can assure you I would not for a moment think of bringing a child into such an arrangement as this,’ she said, turning away from Marc to put the envelope to one side.

Ava heard him move behind her and froze. She silently prayed for him not to touch her in case she betrayed herself. The skin along her bare arms crawled with anticipation of his warm, gliding hands. How many times had he embraced her from behind in the past? His hands would move slowly from her hips to her breasts, cupping her, his mouth nuzzling on the sensitive skin of her neck until she would turn in his arms and offer herself to him.

Her mind exploded with images of them together. The passion he had ignited in her was something she had never experienced before even though she had not been a virgin when they had met.

When his hands came to rest on her hips she shuddered. ‘You find my touch abhorrent, or is it that you are still hungry for it?’ he asked, his warm hint-of-mint breath skating past her ear.

If only he knew! she thought as her heart rammed against her sternum like a giant pendulum inside the body of a too small clock. ‘I told you…I…I want some time to think about this,’ she said, trying to keep her voice even.

He turned her around to face him, his eyes boring into hers. ‘You haven’t got time to think about it, cara,’ he said. ‘You have debts up to your diamond-studded ears.’ He fingered one glittering earlobe. ‘Did he buy these for you?’

Ava’s breath caught in her throat like a scrap of silk on a savage thorn. ‘Y-yes…’

His hands fell to his sides as he commanded, ‘Take them off.’

She frowned again, her stomach nosediving in alarm. ‘What?’

His mouth was bracketed by lines of steel. ‘Take them off and everything else he gave you. Now.’

Ava pressed her lips together to contain her pulsing panic. Was this really her Marc? The man she had fallen in love with so deeply and irrevocably? He was a stranger to her now, a terrifying stranger with not just revenge on his mind, but the total humiliation of her as well.

She would not give in to him.

She would not.

She tightened her hands into fists by her sides, holding his glacial glare with a feisty flash of her own. ‘No.’ Her voice came out too thready and soft, so she repeated it. ‘No. Absolutely not.’

His pupils flared, his mouth flattening even further. ‘I will give you one minute, Ava, otherwise the deal is off. Keep in mind the massive debts your husband left behind. At last count it was in the hundreds of thousands.’ He set the timer on his watch, his dark gaze holding hers challengingly. ‘Your minute starts now.’

She swallowed back her anguish, the determination in his eyes making the base of her spine rattle in fear. ‘D-don’t do this, Marc…’

A nerve flickered at the side of his mouth. ‘If you will not do it then I will do it for you,’ he warned.

Ava believed him well capable of it. Her hands began to tremble as she tried to remove the earrings, her fingers fumbling uselessly until she felt terrifyingly close to tears. She soldiered on, glaring at him bitterly, hating him with such intensity she could taste the acridity of it in her mouth. Finally she got the studs out and placed them on the coffee table to her right.

‘Now the rest,’ he said, standing with his feet apart, his arms folded across his chest in an authoritarian stance that boiled her blood.

Still glaring at him, she took each of her dress rings off and put them beside the earrings. ‘There,’ she said, arching one of her brows at him. ‘Happy now?’

His black eyes stripped her mercilessly. ‘Keep going.’

Ava’s heart lurched against her chest wall. She sent the point of her tongue out over her lips, buying for time, wondering if he wanted her to crumble emotionally, to beg and to plead with him to stop.

She would not do it.

She would not bend or break, she would not cry, she would not beg.

She raised her chin and locked gazes with him. Bluegrey warred with black-brown for a pulsing moment. ‘All right, then,’ she said with a devil-may-care lift of one shoulder as she loosened the catch on her watch. She slipped it off her wrist and placed it beside the earrings and rings.

She straightened and, giving him a challenging look, slipped off her shoes, kicking them to one side before she reached for the zipper at the back of her skirt. She told herself she had stood undressed in front of hundreds of people before while she had been modelling. This would be no different; besides, he had seen it all before. Her body was no secret to him. He knew every curve and contour and every secret place.

The tension in the air was palpable.

Ava slid the zipper down, the metallic sound thunderous in the crackling silence. The fabric slipped to the floor and she stepped out of its circle, her fingers going to the hem of her pull-on top.

Marc’s eyes followed her like a night-vision searchlight. She felt the heat of it scorch her flesh as her top joined her skirt on the floor. She stood before him in a black, French, lace push-up bra and knickers, her chin high, her right hip tilted in a model-like pose. ‘I bought these myself,’ she said with a defiant look.

His lips flickered, his dark eyes gleaming. ‘Prove it.’

Ava clenched her teeth, fighting to keep her cool. He wanted her to fall apart, she had to remember that. He wanted her pride any way he could get it. ‘I don’t have the receipt any more, so I am afraid you will have to take my word for it,’ she said, pushing up her chin to disguise its wobble.

‘Your word?’ His top lip lifted in a mocking curl. ‘Since when should I take as gospel the word of a gold-digger?’

‘I am not a gold-digger,’ she said with quiet but steely dignity.

The timer on his watch beeped, informing her the minute was up.

Ava felt her stomach slip as Marc’s gaze hit hers. ‘Well?’ he said.

She had never felt so naked and exposed in her life and yet she was still wearing more than most people wore on the French Riviera beaches she could see from the villa windows.

‘How much are you going to pay me?’ she asked, knowing it would be exactly the question a gold-digger would ask, but she was beyond caring. Serena was more important than her pride at this point. What her sister had suffered recently was far worse than anything Marc Castellano could do to her.

He named a sum that lifted her brows. ‘Th-that much?’ she asked in a croak.

He gave her an imperious smile, the black holes of his pupils flaring with passionate promise. ‘I am going to make you earn every penny of it, Ava. I don’t suppose you have forgotten how good we were together, hmm?’

Ava felt her cheeks flame with colour. She remembered everything: every touch, every kiss, every incendiary caress and every earth-shattering orgasm that had left her quaking in his arms time and time again. ‘You want some sort of medal for being able to perform an act that humans, even the most base of animals, have been doing for centuries?’ she asked with a cutting look.

He suddenly snagged one of her wrists and pulled her up against him, his chest to her pounding chest and his strong, immovable thighs to her weak, trembling ones. ‘Don’t push me too far, Ava,’ he said in a low growl. ‘I am this close,’ he held up his index finger and thumb a pinch distance apart, ‘to walking out of here and leaving you to face your sugar daddy’s creditors.’

Again Ava desperately wanted to call his bluff. She would have if it hadn’t been for Serena. A vision of her shattered sister, holding the ultrasound picture of the baby she had lost, was the only thing that stopped her. ‘All right,’ she said on an expelled breath. ‘I’ll do it.’

Marc’s hold loosened, but he didn’t release her. Instead his thumb found her thundering pulse, stroking over it in a rhythmic motion that was as powerful as a drug. ‘I will release a Press statement for tomorrow’s papers,’ he said into the silence. ‘We will begin living together as of now.’

Ava looked up at him in wide-eyed trepidation. ‘So…so soon?’

His eyes went to her mouth before returning to hers. ‘I have waited five years to have you where I want you,’ he said.

She gave him an embittered look. ‘Where might that be?’ she asked. ‘In the palm of your hand, begging for mercy?’

He traced a long finger over each of the upper curves of her breasts before dipping into the valley of her cleavage, the nerves beneath her skin going off like miniature explosives. ‘I think you know exactly where I want you,’ he said in a tone that was rough and deep and sensually, sinfully dangerous.

Ava felt her body quiver at the thought of him plunging into her, claiming her as his.

Not in love.

Not in mutual attraction.

But in lustful, hate-filled revenge.…

Chapter Two

IN SPITE of the warmth of the room Ava felt her skin rise in goose pimples. She rubbed at her upper arms, trying so hard to hold her ground. Her head was aching with tension, her mind trying to stay clear and focused while the earth seemed to be shifting beneath her feet. The air was fizzing with Marc’s hatred, high-voltage waves of it zapping at her, making her skin pepper all the more.

‘Are you cold?’ Marc asked.

She kept her mouth rigid with anger. ‘What is that to you?’

He held her glare for a pulsing moment. ‘Have you had dinner?’ he asked.

‘No, and if you think I am going to dine with you dressed like this you can think again,’ she said with a lift of her chin.

He smiled as his gaze raked over her again. ‘Delightful as that sounds, no—I will not take you out in public like that. As of this evening your body is for my eyes and my eyes only.’

Ava found it hard to stand still for the rage that was rumbling through her like seismic activity preceding a massive earthquake. ‘You know there are probably street workers who come much cheaper than me,’ she said, goaded beyond caution.

‘Yes, but I want you,’ he said with a devilish gleam in his black-as-night gaze. ‘We have unfinished business, do we not?’

Ava glared at him. ‘Any business we had ended five years ago. I thought I had made that perfectly clear.’

His top lip lifted in disgust. ‘Oh, yes, by moving out of the apartment I had set up for you without even telling me to my face. I came home to find the place empty apart from a note.’

Ava felt a twinge of guilt about not meeting him face-to-face back then, but she knew if she had he would have persuaded her to stay with him. A note had seemed safer, she’d had more control, the sort of control she had lost the moment she had met and fallen in love with him. She had been so weak where he was concerned, and, although she had put it down to her youth at the time, seeing him again frightened her that it might very well happen all over again. She had come full circle. The irony of it was beyond painful; it was like a razor blade stuck sideways in her throat. She felt as if she could taste the blood of its embedment, the bitter, metallic taste of regret and heartbreak at what she had lost by leaving him, and yet here she was, back in his life and under his command.

Ava lowered her gaze from the accusing glare of Marc’s. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, but it came out grudgingly and not at all convincing.

Marc watched as she stood before him with her bottom lip trembling, her heart-shaped face pale, and her grey-blue eyes like lakes of shimmering liquid.

He turned away, his anger making his movements stiff and jerky. He clenched and unclenched his hands, wanting to punch deep holes in the walls in frustration and fury. It sickened him that he had allowed her to drop his guard. For years he had sworn he would not do as his father had done: become totally captivated by a woman who couldn’t be trusted.

His mother had slept her way through his childhood with an array of other men until she finally left the family home when Marc was seven years old. He could still recall the last time he saw her at the age of ten, getting into the top-of-the-range sports car of her latest rich toy-boy lover, waving at Marc as they drove off to their deaths three hours later on the Amalfi Coast. He had spent the next decade of his life trying to prop up the shattered shell of his father until death—with the aid of large amounts of alcohol—had finally claimed him.

Marc had waited for five years to avenge his bludgeoned pride against Ava McGuire. Five years of meticulously planning his revenge. Step by step he had rebuilt his empire, taking the greatest pleasure in finally bringing Douglas Cole to his knees, with a little help from the stock-market volatility.

Of all the people for her to marry, Ava could not have chosen a better way of ensuring Marc hated her for life. He loathed thinking about his arch enemy making love to her. His mind revolted at the thought of that bloated body heaving over her slim form. But then she was a gold-digger who would always sell herself to the highest bidder. She had just proved it by the way she had agreed to his terms. She had openly taunted him with her beautiful body, but he was not going to take what was on offer until he was good and ready. He wanted her, it was like a virulent fever in his blood, but he was not going to give in to it until she begged him to make love to her. But this time around it would not be making love; it would be sex, nothing but pure physical need that he would enjoy until he tired of her. She would not be the one to walk out on him the way his harlot of a mother had done to his father. This time around Marc would call an end to the relationship when he was satisfied he was over her.

He turned from the view at the windows and faced her. ‘I want this placed stripped of everything that belonged to Cole,’ he said. ‘I have a removals van waiting outside to take everything away in order for my things to be brought in.’

Her slim throat rose and fell over a swallow. ‘There’s not much left of Douglas’s things,’ she said. ‘Since the funeral I have sorted through it all and sent it to his ex-wife and children. The furniture came with the villa when he purchased it.’

‘You have met his ex-wife and family?’ Marc asked, his brows lifting in mild surprise.

She swept the point of her tongue across her lips, swallowing again. ‘Yes, at the funeral. They came all the way from Perth in Australia. Mrs…’ She hesitated for a fraction of a second before continuing, ‘Renata Cole was very pleasant. Adam and Lucy, his adult children, too, were very gracious.’

‘Considering their father had shacked up with a tart,’ he said, watching as her cheeks bloomed with colour.

‘Is this to be part of the deal between us?’ she asked with a defiant spark in her grey-blue eyes. ‘For you to insult me at every available opportunity?’

He ignored her comment to say, ‘You will no longer be using Cole’s name. It is in the legal document I gave you. You are to revert to your maiden name even though you are anything but a maiden.’

She opened her mouth to protest, but he cut her off curtly. ‘Go and get dressed. I have made a booking at a restaurant for dinner.’

Her eyes rounded. ‘You were that sure I would agree to this preposterous plan?’

‘But of course, ma belle,’ he said with a mocking smile. He patted where his wallet was inside his suit jacket pocket. ‘After all, money is the thing you most desire, is it not?’

Her eyes were like twin tornadoes, darkening with fury. ‘Doesn’t it make a difference to know I don’t want it for myself?’ she bit out through tight lips.

He gave a couldn’t-care-less shrug. ‘It is of no importance to me what or who you want it for. I understand the thickness of family blood even though I do not have a sibling. As it stands, I am happy to pay you to entertain me, but only until such time as I feel it is time to call it quits.’

The look she gave him would have sliced through steel. ‘You mean when you’ve ground my pride into the dust.’

Marc moved his lips from side to side, reining in his temper. She had some nerve to lament the damage to her pride, considering what she had done to his. ‘I have already told you to go and get dressed,’ he said. ‘I would advise you to do so and now, otherwise I may very well change my mind and take you dressed as you are.’

She turned with a swish of her shoulder-length blonde hair and padded up the sweeping staircase, the action of her endless legs and neat bottom making the blood surge to his groin.

He shoved his hands deep in his trouser pockets to stop himself from reaching for her as he so often had done in the past. He’d had lovers since, but no one made his blood heat the way Ava McGuire’s did. All she had to do was look at him from those smoky grey-blue eyes of hers and he was rock-hard. He sucked in a harsh breath, fighting against the flood of memories, but it was impossible to mentally sandbag against such powerful sensual recollections. For five years they had tortured him, making him ache with the need to feel her again, to have her in his arms, to hold her and have his fill of her.

He ran a hand through the thickness of his hair as he paced the floor again. He would get her out of his system this time once and for all. Whatever it took, he would do it.

He had to in order to move on with his life. This was his last chance and he was going to make the most of every single minute.

Ava dressed in a slim-fitting black cocktail dress from her short-lived modelling days and, slipping her feet into heels, picked up a small evening bag.

She glanced at her reflection in the mirror, grimacing at the state of her hair. She put her bag down and quickly ran a brush through her tresses so they fell about her shoulders in casual waves. Apart from a dusting of mineral make-up and a quick dab of lip gloss she left the rest of her face alone. It wouldn’t matter what she did to herself—she was never going to be good enough for Marc Castellano, she thought with aching sadness. He enjoyed the company of beautiful women all over the world, women who willingly grasped at the chance to hang off his arm or slip between the sheets of his bed. Ava’s stomach hollowed in anguish at the thought of how many had been there since she had been his mistress. The thought of him touching others the way he had touched her made her feel as if her heart was being wrenched in two. She had tried over the years not to think of it; every time she saw a Press photo of him with yet another glamorous woman on his arm she had quickly turned the page, suppressing the wave of longing until it finally subsided.

When she came down the stairs, Marc was speaking to a man who was dressed in a removals company uniform, the first of some items already placed in the foyer in cardboard boxes.

Ava’s stomach clenched at the thought of how quickly things had changed. Marc had wasted no time in taking possession of the villa; how soon would he insist on the other more intimate terms of the deal? In the past she had shared his bed with love, or at least on her part. But how could she possibly share it with the hatred that bubbled like volcanic mud between them now?

Marc dismissed the man and turned as she came down the last of the stairs, his dark gaze running over her in hot-blooded appraisal. ‘Very nice,’ he said. ‘But then you have always had the amazing ability to look glamorous in whatever you are wearing—’ his eyes glinted as he added ‘—or not wearing.’

Ava hoisted her chin at a haughty height. ‘In case you are wondering, this dress is mine.’

‘Yes, I know,’ he said. ‘I recognise it from our first meeting.’

She tried to hide her reaction to his statement, but it was almost impossible to control the flip and flop and flutter of her pulse. That he remembered such a minor detail made her wonder if he had cared more for her back then than he had let on at the time. He had always seemed so aloof and non-committal when it came to his feelings. She on the other hand had been effusive with stating hers, which had made her feel gauche and immature. She wished she had been a little more sophisticated back then. If only she had been able to look upon their affair as a casual fling she might not have had her hopes crushed so badly. But from the moment their eyes had met across a crowded bar she had felt something fall into place deep inside her. No one else had had that effect on her and after all this time she had come to the conclusion no one else ever would.

Ava followed him out of the villa to a waiting car outside. The driver held the door open for her and waited while she took her seat, with Marc joining her, his long, strong thighs brushing against hers.

He took one of her hands in his, holding her lightly, but with an undercurrent of strength that silently warned her not to try and pull away.

Ava thought of all the times they had dined together in the past. The romantic candlelit dinners where she had gazed into his eyes, his fingers lazily stroking hers, making her heart thud in anticipation of returning to the apartment to make love into the early hours of the morning.

She wondered if he was thinking of those times now. It was so hard to tell what was going on behind the hard mask of his face. He was just as heart-stoppingly gorgeous as before. The faint shadow of regrowth on his jaw made her fingers itch to touch him, to feel that sexy stubble under the soft pads of her fingertips. Her body trembled at the memory of how it had felt to feel his unshaven skin against her inner thighs as he pleasured her with his lips and tongue.

She crossed her legs, trying to quell the pulse of her body, but with him sitting so close it was like trying to stop ice melting under the flare of a blowtorch.

Marc lifted her hand to his mouth, the point of his tongue dipping between the sensitive web between her index and thumb. It was the merest touch, a hot, moist hint of what was to come. Ava shivered and closed her eyes tightly, calling upon every bit of willpower she possessed not to turn in her seat and place her mouth greedily against his.

He kept her hand in his, idly toying with her fingers, outlining the smoothly manicured shape of her nails. Ava was intensely aware of her forearm resting on his muscular thigh, her hand so close to the hot, hard heat of him she ached to explore him, to see if he was responding to her as she was to him. Her eyes glanced sideways, her heart nearly stopping when she saw the tenting of his trousers. She gulped and quickly looked out of the opposite window, but she heard his low deep chuckle, and felt his fingers tighten as they brought hers to his growing erection.

Her heart thumped as she felt his turgid length, her inner muscles contracting and the dew of desire anointing her in spite of every effort to curb her response to him.

‘I can see—or rather, I can feel you haven’t lost your touch, cara,’ he said, keeping her hand against him. ‘Tell me, did you ever service Cole in the back of his limousine?’

His crude question was like a slap across the face with an icy hand. She wrenched her hand out of his, wincing as her wrist caught on the metal band of his watch. She glared at him from her corner of the car, holding her wrist with her other hand, her emotions in turmoil as she struggled to keep control.

‘Did you?’ he asked, his expression hard with bitterness.

‘Would you believe me if I said no?’ she asked with a challenging look.

His eyes bored into hers as if he was deciding whether to believe her or not. ‘You lived with him as his legal wife for five years,’ he said. ‘I can’t imagine there would be much you didn’t do with him, especially with the amount of money he spent on you. That’s probably why he ended up close to bankruptcy, trying to keep your gold-digging hands full of designer goods.’

‘I couldn’t give a damn what you think,’ she said, searching in her evening bag for a tissue. ‘It’s pointless discussing anything with you. You’ve made up your mind and you are never wrong, or so you like to believe.’

Marc frowned as he saw the scratch on the creamy skin of her blue-veined wrist. He took out his handkerchief from his inside pocket and, taking her arm, gently dabbed it. ‘It was not my intention to hurt you,’ he said.

Her grey-blue eyes glittered. ‘That’s the whole point of this, isn’t it? To hurt me until I finally break.’

He frowned and released her arm, stuffing the used handkerchief in his trouser pocket. ‘Perhaps there is a part of me that wants you to suffer the way I suffered,’ he said, looking her in the eye. ‘But I am not a violent man and you can be assured you will always be absolutely safe with me, Ava.’

Safe? Ava wondered if she could ever be safe from his effect on her. She had told herself over the years she no longer loved him. Denying what she felt for him had been a coping mechanism, a way of navigating herself through the heartbreak of having to leave him while she still could. But in the end it had blown up in her face, for men like Marc Castellano didn’t forgive—they got revenge.

She chanced a glance at his brooding expression. He was looking straight ahead, his dark eyes narrowed in fierce concentration, his sensual mouth pulled into an almost straight line. A nerve ticked at the corner of his mouth, like a miniature fist punching beneath the skin.

As if he sensed her eyes on him, he turned and locked gazes. ‘Tell me something,’ he said, his eyes like steel as they pinned hers. ‘Were you involved with Cole the whole time you were seeing me?’

‘Of course not.’ She bit down on her lip. ‘How can you think I would—’

‘A month,’ he bit out the words as if they were bullets, his black eyes flashing with fury. ‘Within a month you were married to that silver-tailed, silver-tongued creep.’

Ava closed her eyes, her head dropping into her hands. ‘I can’t do this…’ Her voice was muffled as she struggled to hold back tears. ‘Please take me back to the villa…’

‘We are going out to dinner as planned,’ he stated intractably.

She lifted her head and threw him a castigating glare. ‘You never used to be such an unfeeling bastard, Marc.’

His eyes brewed with resentment. ‘It’s a bit late to be lamenting my lack of feeling. After all, you were the one who showed me how foolish it is to trust a woman who spouts words of love all the time. But that was your intention from the start, wasn’t it? You lured me in and then once you had me dangling on the line you cast me off for a bigger, richer catch.’

Her brow creased in bewilderment. ‘Is that what you really think?’

‘I should have seen it coming,’ he said, throwing his arm along the back of the seat. ‘I’ve had enough gold-diggers try it on me in the past. You were good, I’ll grant you that. Convincing and beguiling, and that little lie about only having one lover and it being an unpleasant experience was a nice touch. You really had me going there.’

Ava felt as if he had struck her. The pain she felt at his words was indescribable. He was one of the few people she had told of the night she lost her virginity at the age of nineteen. Even Serena, her sister, didn’t know the full details, for Serena had suffered much worse at a much younger age, leaving her scarred and vulnerable for years until she had met Richard. For Marc to throw that confidence back in Ava’s face as if it were a fiction to garner sympathy was beyond cruel.

She was glad the driver pulled up in front of the restaurant Marc had chosen, for she was beyond a reply. She got out of the car with stiff movements, not even flinching when Marc took her arm and looped it through his.

The restaurant was crowded, but the table the maître d’ led them to was in a more secluded area. The lighting was low and intimate, the décor luxurious, the service attentive but not intrusive.

‘Would you like an aperitif?’ Marc asked after the waiter left them with a drinks menu.

‘Soda with a twist of lime,’ Ava answered, ignoring the extensive list of alcoholic drinks in front of her.

Marc raised his brows. ‘Frightened you might lose your inhibitions and have your wicked way with me?’

She flicked her hair back behind her shoulders, sending him another caustic look. ‘You can’t make me sleep with you, Marc,’ she said.

He leant back in his chair, his gaze running over her tauntingly. ‘I don’t think it would be too hard to get you begging for it. After all, your sugar daddy has been dead for some weeks now and there has been nothing in the Press about you having found a replacement. A woman like you is not made for celibacy.’

Ava buried her head in the menu rather than meet his sardonic gaze. It annoyed her to think how vulnerable she was to him. Her hand was still tingling from his touch earlier, and her body still smouldering. Every time she chanced a glance at him he seemed to be looking at her mouth, making her lips buzz and swell with anticipation of the passionate pressure of his. She wondered if he was stealthily planning his seduction, taking his time about it to make her feel on tenterhooks. If he was he was certainly succeeding. She could barely sit still in her chair at the thought of him possessing her again. Her inner muscles flickered with an on-off pulse that made it hard for her to concentrate. All she could think of was how it would feel to have him drive into her moist warmth the way he used to do. He was an adventurous lover and yet he could be surprisingly tender too. She had loved that about him, the way he made sure her needs were met before he sought his own release.

What would making love with him now be like? she wondered. Would his quest for revenge make him selfish and demanding instead of considerate and sensually satisfying? Would he treat her like the moneyhungry woman he thought she was?

Ava put down the menu with a trembling hand. How had her dreams for a happy life turned into such a nightmare? All she had ever wanted was to find a man who would love her and protect her, to build a family, the sort of family she and Serena had missed out on by the early death of their mother and the rapid remarriage of their father to the woman who had been callously and rather too obviously waiting for her predecessor to die.

Ava had thought Marc was that special man of her dreams, but within a few weeks of living with him she had come to see a happy future would never be realised with him. He was too much of a playboy, a man who was used to having what he wanted, when he wanted. He was driven to succeed. She had never met a more driven man. He worked hard and he played hard. She had become a part of that play time, but only a very small part and she knew, just like all the other women he had been involved with, her days had been numbered. She had cut the countdown by leaving him, hoping it would protect her from further hurt, not realising how it had played right into the enemy’s hands…

‘Have you decided what you would like to eat?’ Marc asked.

Ava placed her hands in her lap, twisting them together to stop them from shaking. ‘I’m not all that hungry,’ she said.

He lifted one of his brows. ‘Dieting?’

She gave him a resentful look. ‘No. I am angry at how you have orchestrated this…this situation.’

His eyes continued to tether hers. ‘I am the one who has the right to be angry, Ava, not you. You betrayed me, remember?’

Ava’s hands tightened in her lap. She hated thinking of how she had been manipulated into destroying him. How could she have not seen it? It had been a masterful set-up and she had stepped up to the noose without suspecting a thing until it was too late. How could she tell him how blind she had been? He would think she was trying to wriggle out of what she had done by playing the innocent victim. ‘It wouldn’t matter what I said. You’re never going to believe me, are you?’ she said.

His jaw ticked. ‘I am not going to let you make a fool of me again,’ he said. ‘This time around I will have my eyes trained on you at all times and in all places.’

Ava stiffened. ‘What does that mean? Are you’re going to have me followed?’

His expression was inscrutable. ‘Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Let’s say I am taking the necessary steps to keep what is mine exclusively mine this time around.’

She glared at him. ‘Women are not possessions you can own, Marc, or at least not in this century.’

He gave a lift of one shoulder as if he couldn’t care less what she thought. ‘If you are not going to eat then you can watch me, as I am starving,’ he said, signalling for the waiter.

‘No doubt all the machinations you’ve been engineering have worked up quite some appetite,’ she put in spitefully.

His eyes glinted as he laid the menu to one side. ‘Not just for food, ma belle,’ he said. ‘I have other appetites that require satiation, but I am prepared to delay gratification, for a little while at least.’

Ava narrowed her eyes in wariness. ‘What do you mean by that?’

He gave her an enigmatic slant of his lips that was almost a smile. ‘You think I am such an animal that I would insist on you sleeping with me from day one?’

She pursed her mouth, thinking about it for a moment. ‘You’re paying me a lot of money,’ she said at last. ‘I am not sure why you would want to wait on your return on it unless you have a specific agenda in mind.’

‘I have no agenda other than the one I stated earlier,’ he said. ‘I want you to be my temporary mistress. It’s as simple as that.’

The waiter approached, which meant Ava had no chance to respond. She gave the man her simple order, while her mind shuffled through various scenarios.

Marc was a proud and bitter man who wanted revenge for the way she had supposedly betrayed him. He had gone to extraordinary lengths to get her back into his life, but it seemed he was not going to rush her into his bed.

Why?

She chewed at her lip as she heard him interact with the waiter, her eyes watching his mouth, the way it moved with each word he articulated. His lips were beautifully sculptured, the lower one fuller than the top one, hinting at the sensuality she had already experienced. Her mouth tingled at the memory of the pressure of his, the way his tongue had played with hers, teasing it, taming it and mating with it until she had melted in his arms.

Marc looked across the table and met her eyes, a hot spurt of lust shooting through his groin as he saw the way her small white teeth were playing with her soft lips. She released her lower lip and the blood flowed back into it, making him want to crush his mouth to hers to taste her beguiling sweetness. Her grey-blue gaze wavered for a moment under the scrutiny of his, her guilt no doubt making her lower it in shame.

His gut twisted with knots of tension as he thought of the photographs in the Press of her wedding to Cole. She had been a beautiful bride; he had never seen a more stunning one, which had somehow made it so much worse. He fisted his hands beneath the table, not trusting himself to hold his wine glass without breaking it. Hardly a day went past when those images didn’t taunt him with her perfidy. What a fool he had been to trust her the way he had. He had thought she was playing a game when she left him. He had bided his time, waiting for her to come crawling back to him, begging him to take her back as his mistress. But instead she had humiliated him in the most devastating way possible.

But he was five years older now, five years wiser and five years more successful and powerful. This time things would be different. Ava McGuire had humiliated him before, but this time around he was going to have her right where he wanted her.

Not with his ring on her finger, not even in the palm of his hand, but in his bed for as long as he wanted her.

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