Kitabı oku: «The Disobedient Mistress», sayfa 3

After tea, Misty went upstairs and opened the wardrobe which contained the clothing that Flash had insisted on buying her in an effort to lift her out of her depression after Philip had broken off their engagement. Fancy frivolous designer garments that had not seen the light of day in over two years. She selected a turquoise faux snakeskin skirt and top and a pair of spiky-heeled shoes. After a quick bath, she dug out her cosmetics, which dated from the same period and which had been similiarly shelved after she had said goodbye to her brief foray into Flash’s glitzy, unreal world.

Flash had transformed her into a rock-star chick and she had learned how to make the best of her looks. Not that it had been much comfort then to see a sexy, daring image in the mirror when the man that she had loved had rejected her. It had wrecked things between her and Flash too, she acknowledged with pained regret. The day Flash had made her fanciable on his own terms had seemed to be the beginning of the end of their friendship. He had stopped thinking of her as a sister, stopped seeing her as the skinny little kid who had shared the same foster home with him for almost five years and had decided that he wanted more.

Making use of the elderly car that only Nancy used now, Misty drove over to the country house hotel where Leone Andracchi was staying. The gracious foyer exuded expensive exclusivity, and when she enquired at the desk she was informed that Leone was in the dining room.

While she hovered, working out whether she ought to wait or seek him out in the midst of his meal, a fair-haired male emerged from the lounge bar and stopped dead at the sight of her, reacting in a similiar vein to the doorman, who had surged to open the door for her, and the male receptionist, who had tripped over a waste-paper basket in his haste to attend to her.

‘Misty…?’

For a split second, Misty thought she was dreaming for, even though it had been three years since she had heard it, she recognised that hesitant, well-bred voice immediately and she spun round in shock. ‘ Philip?’

‘It’s been so long since I’ve seen you.’ Philip Redding stared at her; indeed, his inability to stop staring was marked. ‘How a-are you?’ he stammered.

‘Fine…’ Her lips barely moved as her silver-grey eyes lingered on him for, although they still lived within miles of each other, she had been careful to avoid places where they had been likely to meet and, apart from seeing his car on the road occasionally, had been very successful in ensuring that they had not run into each other again.

‘You look…you look quite incredible.’ His colour heightened as he found himself forced to tilt his head back to meet her gaze. ‘I’ve often thought of calling in at Fossetts—’

‘With your wife and children?’ Misty enquired in brittle disbelief.

Philip paled and stiffened. ‘Just the one child…Helen and I are getting a divorce, actually…it didn’t work out.’

Twenty feet away, Leone Andracchi stilled, stunned by the vision of Misty Carlton shorn of her shapeless grey suit. With her wealth of copper hair tumbling loose, eyes that gleamed like polished silver were soft on the face of the man she was regarding, her wide peach tinted mouth parted to show pearly teeth. Leone could not quite work out what she was wearing. The top seemed to be held up by the narrow chains bisecting her slight shoulders. The rich fabric gleamed beneath the lights accentuating the thrust of her breasts, the slender indent of her waist, and screeched to a death-defying halt above long, long, endless legs capable of stopping traffic.

‘Misty…?’

Taken aback by Philip’s blunt admission that his marriage was heading for the divorce courts, Misty shifted her attention to the tall dark male poised several feet away. Leone Andracchi. She collided with sizzling golden eyes that seemed to burn up all the available oxygen in the atmosphere and instantly she tensed, butterflies fluttering in her tummy. But even as she reacted to his vibrant presence her mind was marching on to make uneasy comparisons between the two men. Leone was much taller, more powerfully built and strikingly dark next to Philip with his boyish fair good looks.

‘Sorry if I’ve kept you waiting, amore,’ Leone murmured smooth as silk, moving to her side to place an infuriatingly possessive hand on her spine.

‘Philip Redding…’ Philip shot out a hand with all the easy friendliness that was natural to him. ‘Misty and I are old friends.’

‘How fascinating,’ Leone drawled in a tone of crushing boredom that made the younger man flush. ‘Unfortunately, Misty and I are running late.’

‘Look, I’ll call you,’ Philip told Misty, giving Leone a bewildered look, quite out of his depth when faced with such a complete lack of answering courtesy.

‘Don’t waste your time,’ Leone advised before Misty could respond, shooting Philip a derisive glance of cold menace as he pressed her over to the lift and hit the call button with one stab of a punitive finger. ‘She won’t be available.’

Her face flaming but her lips sealed, for she could not intervene when she did not want Philip to phone Fossetts and upset Birdie, Misty stalked into the lift while listening to Philip mutter in disconcerted response, ‘Well, I must say…really, for goodness’ sake…’

‘Do you like behaving like the playground bully?’ Misty enquired dulcetly as the lift doors whirred shut.

‘While you’re with me, you don’t talk to other men…you don’t even look at other men,’ Leone delivered with simmering emphasis.

Misty clashed head-on with brilliant golden eyes that went straight for the jugular and a bone-deep charge of grateful excitement surged through her long, slender length for the very last thing she wanted to think about just then was Philip, whose rejection had torn her apart with grief and despair for longer than she cared to recall. ‘Is that a fact?’

‘Particularly old flames…’ Leone decreed, impervious to sarcasm.

Misty tilted her copper head back and shrugged a slim shoulder, glorious silver eyes wide and mocking, the knot of sexual tension he had already awakened licking through her like a dangerous drug in her bloodstream. ‘Then you had better watch me well.’

‘No. I’m paying for total fidelity and the illusion that you have eyes for no other man,’ Leone imparted without hesitation. ‘Flirting with Redding was out of line.’

‘Flirting…?’ An involuntary laugh empty of humour was wrenched from Misty, the emotions roused by that unfortunate encounter with her ex-fiancé breaking loose of her control. ‘Philip’s the last man alive I’d flirt with!’

‘I saw the way you looked at him,’ Leone said with grim clarity.

‘And how was that?’ Misty queried unevenly, curious in spite of herself.

‘Do I need to draw pictures?’

Her silver-grey eyes darkened as a shard of bitter pain from the past assailed her but she veiled her gaze in self-protection. So for an instant she had recalled happier times when Philip had meant the world to her, but those days were very far behind her. And why was she so sure of that reality? Three years earlier, she had only been engaged to Philip for six weeks when a drunk driver had crashed into Philip’s car. Although Philip had sustained only a concussion, Misty had suffered internal injuries and had required surgery. Afterwards she had learned that she might never be able to conceive a child and Philip had found the threat of a childless future impossible to accept. But never let it be said that Philip was unfeeling: after all, he had had tears in his eyes when he’d ditched her, when he’d told her that he’d still loved her but that she wasn’t really a proper woman any more…

‘Redding was all over you like a rash—’

‘He didn’t even touch me!’

‘He didn’t get the chance.’

As Leone rested a lean hand on Misty’s spine to prompt her out of the lift again, she jerked away and flung her bright head high, sending him a warning look from bright silver eyes. ‘I don’t see an audience, so keep your hands to yourself!’

CHAPTER THREE

MISTY’S eyes leapt in skittish mode round the luxurious hotel suite while she struggled to disguise the fact that her whole body wanted to shake as if she were a leaf in a high wind.

She could not credit that that brief meeting with Philip should have brought so many wounding memories to the surface and destabilised her to such an extent. But then she had worked long and hard to bury all that pain, to rise above the cruel concept that fertility was the sole measure of femininity, and had learned to focus on another future other than that of a husband and a family.

‘Would you like a drink?’ Leone Andracchi enquired.

‘No, thanks.’

‘Possibly it might calm your nerves—’

Misty whirled round in a surge of fury that erupted so suddenly it made her feel dizzy with the strength of it. ‘There’s nothing wrong with my nerves! Stop trying to put me down—’

Brilliant dark golden eyes rested on her. ‘So the wimp upset you—’

‘Don’t talk about Philip like that…you don’t know him.’

‘I don’t need to,’ Leone purred, surveying her with sardonic amusement. ‘He showed himself up.’

Misty threw back her head, copper hair flying back from her flushed cheekbones. ‘No, I think you did. I don’t like aggressive men.’

A slow, winging smile slanted his wide, sensual mouth. She had the maddening suspicion that, far from her drawing blood with her retaliation, he was actually enjoying the exchange. ‘I’m not aggressive…I’m strong and you like that.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

A winged ebony brow quirked. ‘Don’t you?’

She could feel the tense silence buzzing around her. Her mouth had run dry and her heart was thumping like a trapped bird against her ribs. She looked at him: so very tall and lean with the sleek, honed, muscular build and grace of a natural athlete. His cropped, slightly curly black hair gleamed in the lamp light that picked out every fabulous angle of his bone structure, accentuating the carved cheekbones, the hollows beneath, the firm, sensual line of his mouth. Drop-dead gorgeous, as she had been refusing to acknowledge from the moment he’d appeared in the downstairs foyer and shadowed Philip like Everest looming over a bump in the lawn.

Entrapped by those smouldering dark golden eyes, she could look nowhere else and every breath that quivered through her felt like a huge effort. The taut peaks of her breasts ached and a sliding, curling sensation low in her pelvis made her tighten her thighs. Her knees had developed a slight tremor and all the time she was aware only of the almost terrifying rise of anticipation that took account of nothing but the fierce longing gripping her.

‘You want me…I want you, but it’s not going to happen,’ Leone breathed in a charged undertone that rasped down her sensitive spine like a roughened caress. ‘This is strictly business and we don’t need to make it complicated.’

Stark disconcertion rippled through Misty. She felt stripped naked, exposed. Urgent words of proud denial brimmed on her lips until she saw the way his burning gaze was homed in on her mouth and she trembled, the excitement climbing again, mindless and without conscience.

‘Business…’ Leone repeated thickly.

Someone rapped on the door and, although the knock was light, Misty flinched, dredged from her fever with a sense of guilty embarrassment. As the door opened and a young man appeared with a file in his hand she turned to stare out the window, breathing in slow and deep, fighting to still the nervous tremors currenting through her. Nobody had ever had so powerful an effect on her and it was starting to scare her: it was as if she had no control over herself around him, as if her brain went walkabout. But he was feeling that pull too. That shook her, surprised her, made her feel a little less mortified. Although she knew that the worst thing she could do would be to lower her guard around a male like Leone Andracchi, the knowledge that the attraction was mutual still made her feel better about herself, better than she had felt in a long time.

The door snapped shut and she turned back.

‘This is the agreement I mentioned.’ Leone extended a document. ‘Read it and then sign.’

Misty accepted the document. ‘And if I don’t sign?’

‘We don’t have a deal.’

She sat down and began to read. It was typical employment contract stuff, no mention of her pretending to be his mistress or of clothes or apartments either. However, there was a clause that said she would forfeit all benefits and payments if she tried to walk out before he considered the job complete. She didn’t like, that but her attention was caught by the sum of cash he was offering in return and that amount bereft her of breath. Enough money to keep the mortgage on Fossetts ticking over for the next year and more, as well as allowing sufficient funds to settle her outstanding bills and cover staff salaries during her absence.

Cheeks burning, Misty swallowed hard and looked up. ‘You’re being very generous…but what am I supposed to think about this bit that says I can’t walk out on this without your agreement?’

‘You may think what you like,’ Leone murmured levelly, ‘but I assure you that the position won’t entail anything either immoral, illegal or dangerous.’

None the wiser, but still troubled that he saw the necessity of making that stipulation, Misty lifted the pen from the table in front of her. He wasn’t going to explain himself and she couldn’t afford to throw away the only lifebelt on offer.

‘Wait…’ Striding back to the door, Leone called the young man back in to witness her signature and his own.

Such devotion to legal detail rather unnerved Misty. When the document was duly removed, she smoothed her damp palms down over her skirt. ‘Now what?’

‘Just a few details. I’ll send a car to pick you up at nine on Monday—’

‘This Monday coming?’ Misty questioned. ‘That’s only six days from now—’

‘I want this show up and running for the following weekend.’ Leone settled a notepad down on the coffee-table. ‘Make a note of your measurements. You need a new wardrobe.’

Misty bridled at both the instruction and that announcement. ‘I already have quite a few presentable outfits—’

‘But maybe I’m not into the rock-chick look.’ Leone dealt her startled face a sardonic appraisal. ‘Maybe I prefer a more elegant and subtle image.’

Rock chick? Misty coloured with annoyance and chagrin, for her top only bared her arms and her skirt was not that short. However, she was more concerned by what his choice of that particular label had revealed. ‘You know about Flash, don’t you? How?’

‘Don’t be so naive. Do you really think I would’ve offered you this role without knowing anything about you?’

When he put it like that, he did make her sound naive, but she didn’t like the idea that he had run some sort of a check on her background. He had contrived to make a connection known to precious few and, after her time with Flash, Misty had soon learned that just about everybody who did know assumed that she had slept with her former foster brother and that arguing otherwise made little impression.

‘There’s nothing wrong with what I’m wearing,’ Misty said defensively.

Leone surveyed her with exasperated dark golden eyes. ‘Tell me, is it your special mission in life to argue with my every simple request?’

‘You don’t request, you order, but bearing in mind that this is supposed to be a job, I’ll try to be more receptive.’

‘Thank you so much.’

Misty drew in a deep steadying breath. Tight-lipped, she filled in her measurements on the notepad, tossed it aside and said equally drily, ‘Anything else?’

‘Have you always found it this difficult to follow instructions?’

Misty nodded in grudging acknowledgement.

Leone shifted a fluid and expressive hand. ‘It’s very irritating.’

Misty folded her arms with a jerk. ‘Anything else happening next Monday?’

‘You get a complete make-over and move into the apartment. We’ll go out in the evening—’

‘Where?’

‘I haven’t decided yet. Any questions?’

None that Misty thought that he would answer, and she stood up. ‘Is that it, then?’

‘I’ll see you out to your car—’

‘No need,’ Misty said in surprise.

Leone swung open the door for her exit and said nothing.

Teeth gritting, Misty stood in the lift with him in silence.

Head high, she crossed the foyer and stalked out onto the steps where a lean hand caught hold of hers.

’What?’ Misty snapped, forced to swing back.

Leone closed her other hand into his too. She connected with smouldering golden eyes that sent her heartbeat racing and her tummy gave an apprehensive somersault. ‘Don’t…’

Black lashes low over his slumbrous gaze, Leone stared down at her with vibrant amusment. ‘Stop trying to pretend it’s a punishment, amore.’

Her colour heightened and her slender body quivered as he drew her closer. His sensual mouth drifted down onto hers with an aching sweetness that took her wholly by surprise. She trembled and almost without her own volition pressed forward into the hard, muscular heat of him, every skincell in her body leaping in excited reaction. It was an intoxicating kiss—searching, erotic, teasing, and she could not get enough of that sensual exploration. A low moan sounded deep in her throat.

Leone set her back from him. ‘A very convincing pretence,’ he murmured with roughened satisfaction.

Her fingers jerked in the grip of his, her anger provoked by an intense sense of embarrassment. ‘You—!’

‘Temper, temper.’ A wry smile slashed his lean, strong face.

Misty dragged her hands free of his and said icily, ‘Goodnight.’

Halfway across the car park, she glanced over her shoulder and saw that he had moved to the foot of the steps to watch her progress. Not quite as confident in dark car parks as she liked to pretend, Misty was relieved. She was digging into her bag for her keys when a male figure appeared from behind Birdie’s car and a gasp of fright broke from her lips.

‘It’s only me, Misty,’ Philip groaned. ‘I recognised Birdie’s old car and parked behind it—’

‘You scared the life out of me!’ Misty settled her bag on the bonnet of the car to better enable her search for her keys, furious that she hadn’t got them out before leaving the hotel and rigid with discomfiture in Philip’s radius.

‘I’m sorry, but I thought it would be easier to talk to you here rather than at Fossetts where I’m sure I’m not very popular—’

‘We don’t have anything to talk about. I’m sorry that your marriage has run into trouble…genuinely sorry,’ Misty stressed awkwardly without looking at him. ‘But it’s not as though we’re even friends any more, is it?’

‘Just listen to me. I never got over you,’ Philip swore emotively. ‘I was crazy to rush off and marry Helen—’

‘I don’t want to hear that kind of stuff from you.’ Keys in her shaking hand, Misty struggled to find the lock and make good her escape. ‘Please go home.’

‘You heard her. Back off.’ It was Leone, his dark, deep, accented drawl as welcome at that moment as a rescue squad, his shadow blocking out Philip’s, his long, sure fingers removing the keys from hers to unlock the door of the car. In her surprise and relief, she glanced up at him, noting how the aggression he had earlier denied was stamped into every line of his lean, powerful face, but not one atom of that aggression was aimed at her. Philip was the unhappy recipient and Philip, she saw out of the corner of her eye, had already backed off so far that he would need a loud hailer to continue their dialogue.

‘Thanks,’ Misty said raggedly, diving into Birdie’s ancient car at supersonic speed.

‘No problem. Did that idiot scare you?’ Leone demanded.

‘No…’ Misty lied, attention nervously lodged to the clenched fist within view. ‘No, not at all.’

Without another glance at either man, she drove off, but she stopped a mile down the road to wipe her tear-wet face dry with a tissue. No, she no longer cared about Philip, but her memories hurt terribly. How could Philip even think that his interest might still be welcome after the way he had treated her?

Within six months of ditching her, he had married a well-bred blonde with a cut-glass accent and a double-barrelled surname—exactly the sort of young woman his snobbish mother had always wanted him to marry. And within a year he had become father to a beautiful baby boy. Misty might not have seen Philip in recent years but she had seen his wife and child out shopping on several occasions. She would never forget the pain of first seeing their baby and knowing that that special joy was unlikely ever to be hers. It seemed all wrong too that the son that Philip had sworn he could not live without having some day should now be caught up in the miseries of a divorce.

Sucking in a steadying breath, Misty drove home. After she had got over Philip, she had forced herself out on dates purely to please Birdie. But when she had casually encouraged those men to share their aspirations, she had discovered that they too took it for granted that their future would hold children and paled at the gills at the mere mention of a woman with fertility problems.

It was one thing for a man to marry a woman unaware that there might be a problem in that department, another thing entirely for him to do so armed with that knowledge. That took either a very special love or a male who didn’t want kids. So to protect herself from that horrible sinking feeling of inadequacy, of seeing herself as something less than other women and of having to ultimately face confiding the consequences of that car smash in any more lasting relationship, she had given up on dating and had concentrated on setting up her business instead.

And she had been perfectly happy and content until Leone Andracchi had come along and reminded her that she was still a woman and still susceptible to all the feelings and fancies that she had foolishly assumed she could shut out and ignore. In his vicinity she had all the resistance of a schoolgirl with a bad crush and that hammered her pride hard. But what worried her most was the awareness that Leone Andracchi fascinated her: his every move fascinated her, even though he infuriated her.

Had he insisted on seeing her out to the car park because he’d suspected that Philip might still have been hanging around? Or had that just been coincidence? Surely it must have been coincidence. Yet why was she receiving the impression that, even when Leone was faking a caring role, he was a very possessive guy with the women in his life? After all, he seemed prone to standing over her like a Rottweiler guarding a bone!

But obviously she had picked up the wrong impression and Leone was simply a good actor, for Clarice had brought in a couple of glossy gossip magazines in which he had featured with various beauties and Misty had formed a picture of a very different male. A guy so cool in relationships that ice might be cosy in comparison. A guy who got bored very easily and without apology, generous to a fault but ungiven to commitment or romantic gestures, indeed the guy most likely to forget your birthday, overlook St Valentine’s Day and cancel dates last minute in favour of work. A guy whose lovers always looked nervous, as if at any moment they awaited the news that they were no longer flavour of the month. In short, an absolute rat, whom any sensible woman would avoid like the plague…as would she to the best of her ability.

On the day that Leone had arranged, Misty arrived in London. While the chauffeur removed her two bulging suitcases from the boot of the opulent limousine that had collected her from Fossetts, Misty stared up at the massive ultra-modern apartment building shadowing the pavement.

Over the last week, while she had closed up her business premises and made a dozen last minute arrangements to take care of various matters, she had been conscious of a positively childish little glow of growing excitement. She was embarrassed by that reality but had been forced to concede that her life had been pretty uneventful for a long while. Although she would hate seeing less of Birdie, the change of scene was especially welcome after the stress and worry she had suffered in recent months.

Travelling up in the lift, she studied her reflection in the mirrored wall and frowned. All anxious eyes and mouth, she thought ruefully, no alteration there, nothing very special either, although Leone must have seen something to have behaved as he had. Unfortunately, her self-esteem had sunk to an all-time low after Philip and had never really recovered. After all, that self-esteem had been a hard-won achievement even before Philip had entered her life.

So many people had broken promises to Misty that it had taken a very long time for her to learn to trust anyone. She could still recall her mother clear as day: a beautiful redhead with lovely clothes and a constant embattled air of uneasy apology.

‘As soon as I get organised, you can come and live with me,’ her mother had promised repeatedly when Misty had been living in care. ‘I gave your sister up for adoption…you know she was sickly and I could never have managed her…but I couldn’t bring myself to give you up as well.’

But Misty had lived from birth to adulthood in foster care and by the time she was five her mother’s occasional visits had become only a memory. Years later, it had been a shock to discover that her parent had remarried within eighteen months of her birth and that there had never been any question of her bringing her illegitimate daughter into the marital home when her second husband was not even aware of Misty’s existence.

A trim older man in a steward’s jacket introduced himself as Alfredo at the door of the apartment. She stepped into a very large hall floored in marble and glanced into a reception room, which rejoiced in minimal modern furniture and a decor of white on white. The only colour she could see came from the artworks on display. It was fashionable and elegant but cold and unappealing, she reflected in some disappointment.

Well, what had she expected? she asked herself ruefully. Cosy clutter? Having shown her into a spacious bedroom complete with dressing room and en suite facilities, Alfredo passed her a sheet of paper headed, ‘Appointments.’ At that point, Misty realised that a busy afternoon lay ahead of her at various beauty establishments and she grimaced. Evidently, Leone was of the opinion that in the looks department she needed all the professional help she could get!

By the end of those appointments some hours later, her hair coaxed into a streaming mane and her practical short nails disguised by fake perfection, Misty had decided that being a mistress, pretend or otherwise, promised to be the most boring existence imaginable.

The limousine was on the way back to the apartment and stuck in the teatime traffic when Leone called her on the car phone. ‘I’ll pick you up at seven,’ he informed her, the rich timbre of his dark, deep drawl making her spine tingle.

She breathed in deep. ‘Where are we going?’

‘A movie première.’

‘Oh…’ Misty was disconcerted, not having expected anything like such a grand public occasion.

‘Wear the jewellery,’ he told her huskily. ‘I chose diamonds for you.’

Back at the apartment she went straight to her bedroom. A shallow heart-shaped case sat on the dressing table and she clicked it open to a breathtaking diamond necklace and drop earrings. Dragging her attention from them in astonishment, she noted that her suitcases had disappeared. An examination of the dressing room not only revealed that her luggage had been unpacked but also revealed a large selection of new garments in her size. In addition, a long slinky silvery gown with slender straps hung in apparent readiness for her and it carried the label of one of the world’s most exclusive designers.

At half-past seven, Misty strolled into the vast lounge where Leone was poised by the floor-deep windows. Even from the back he looked spectacular: sunlight gleaming on his proud dark head, wide shoulders tapering to narrow hips and long, powerful legs.

‘I don’t like being kept waiting,’ Leone delivered before he even turned round.

‘You didn’t give me much warning.’ Misty stilled, copper head high, slim body taut as she waited for him to look at her.

He swung round. ‘Dio mio…you spent the entire afternoon getting ready!’

Dark golden eyes glinting with impatience zeroed in on her and then narrowed to stare.

Misty knew that she had never looked better. The shimmer of the silver and the glitter of the diamonds flattered her copper hair and fair complexion and the dress was a dream of deceptive simplicity cut to enhance her slender curves. A fashionable frilled split ran to high above her knee and revealed one slim, shapely leg shod in a kitten-heeled diamanté shoe.

The silence was electric.

‘You look fantastic,’ Leone breathed in another voice entirely, his rich drawl roughening. His screened gaze roamed from her silvery eyes and the glow in her triangular face to linger on the ripe pout of her burgundy tinted mouth before travelling on downward to absorb the full effect of the dress.

Beneath that intent scrutiny Misty’s mouth had run dry and she was alarmingly short of breath. Aware of his vibrant masculinity with every skincell in her thrumming body, she fought to get a grip on a sudden inexplicable sense of euphoria. ‘Thank you.’

‘That doesn’t mean that you’re forgiven for keeping me waiting,’ Leone asserted in the hall.

‘You might as well get used to it,’ Misty dared. ‘Outside business hours, I’m always running late—’