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CHAPTER TWO

SORCHA had met Cesare di Arcangelo the summer she’d turned eighteen, the hottest summer for decades. It had been the year she’d left school and the year most of her classmates had finally rid themselves of the burden of their virginity—but Sorcha had not been among them. Her friends had laughed and called her old-fashioned, but she’d been holding out for someone special.

But that summer she had felt as ripe and ready as some rich fruit ready for picking—and hormones had bubbled like cauldrons in her veins.

She’d arrived home from a final school trip to France on a baking hot day with a sky of blinding brightness. There had been no one to meet her at the station, and no reply when she’d phoned the house, but it hadn’t particularly bothered her. She’d had little luggage, and because it was beautiful and so green, and so English after the little mountain village of Plan-du-Var, she had decided to walk.

The air had been unnaturally still and the lane dusty, but the sky had been the clearest blue imaginable—with birds singing their little hearts out—and suddenly Sorcha had felt glad to be home, even if she was slightly apprehensive about the future.

Up until that moment everything had been safely mapped out for her—but with the freedom which came from leaving school came uncertainty too. Still, she had worked hard, and she’d been offered a place at one of the best universities in the country if her exam results were as good as had been predicted.

She’d approached the house by the long drive—the honey-coloured mansion where Whittakers had lived since her great-great-grandfather had first got the bright idea of marketing his wife’s delicious home-made sauce. From humble terraced house beginnings, her great-great-grandma’s unique recipe had become a national institution, and soon enough money had poured in to enable him to satisfy his land-owning longings and buy himself a real-life stately home.

But of course that had been in the days before a croissant or a bowl of muesli had become staple breakfast fare—in the days when a full fry-up with Whittaker Sauce had been the only way to start the day. The slow, gradual decline in the family fortunes had soon begun, but it had been so slow that you didn’t really notice it, and it was much easier to ignore something if it just crept up on you.

Sorcha had given a small sigh of satisfaction as she’d looked towards the house, because in that moment it hadn’t looked stately, it had just looked like home. From this far away you didn’t really notice that the walls were crumbling and the roof needed replacing, and of course in the summer months it really came into its own.

Come winter and there would be so much frost on the inside of the windows you could write your initials in it and see the steam of your breath as it rushed out against the cold air. Anyone else might have capitalised on the house’s assets and sold it, but not Sorcha’s mother, who was hanging on to it with grim determination.

‘It’s a huge asset,’ Mrs Whittaker always pronounced, and no one could argue with that. Rural it might look—but a few miles beyond its expansive grounds lay a road which took you straight into London in less than an hour.

Pushing open the oak front door, Sorcha had gone inside to an echoing silence, where dust motes had danced in the beams of sunlight which flooded in through the stained glass. She’d seen a man’s cashmere sweater lying on one of the chairs—beautiful and soft in palest grey—and raised her eyebrows. A bit classy for Rupert! Her brother must have given himself a pay rise.

The house had been empty—so she’d gone up to her bedroom, with its schoolgirl echoes of prizes—rosettes won at horseriding and shiny silver cups for swimming.

From there she could see the pool, and to her astonishment she’d seen that it had been cleared—instead of turgid green water with leaves floating on it like dead lilies it was a perfectly clear rectangle of inviting aquamarine.

Pulling open a drawer, she’d found a swimsuit and squeezed herself into it—she must have grown a lot since last year. Overnight, she’d seemed to go from being a beanpole of an adolescent to having the curvy shape of a real woman. She was going to have to go shopping.

The water had felt completely delicious as she’d dived in and begun to swim, length after length of slicing crawl, each stroke taking her further and further into a daydream. She’d been so wrapped up in her thoughts that she hadn’t noticed the man who was standing there until she had come up for breath, exhausted, sucking in the warm summer air as the water streamed down her hair in rivulets.

Sorcha had started. For a moment all she’d registered was jet-dark hair and silken olive skin, but as she’d blinked the water out of her eyes she’d seen that it was a stranger—and a disturbingly handsome stranger, to boot.

In a pair of faded jeans and an old black T-shirt, he’d looked like one of the gardeners her mother employed to try and make a dent in the overgrowth at the beginning of every season. Unfortunately, he’d also had the arrogant and mocking air of a man who was supremely sexy and who knew it. His black eyes had gleamed and suddenly Sorcha had felt unaccountably shy.

‘Who…are you?’ she questioned.

She rose out of the water like a nymph and Cesare froze, his mouth drying as he saw the firm flesh, green eyes and the lush, perfect curve of her breasts. Madre di Dio—but she was exquisite.

‘My name is Cesare di Arcangelo,’ he murmured, in a velvety-soft accent which matched his exotic looks.

‘You’re Italian?’

‘I am.’

‘And…Well…’ She didn’t want to be rude, but really he could be anyone. And he was so dangerously gorgeous that she felt…peculiar. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Take a guess, signorina.’

‘You’ve come to clean the pool?’

He had never been mistaken for a worker before! Cesare’s mouth curved into a smile.

He guessed who she must be. Her hair was too wet to see its real colour, but her eyes were green with flecks of gold—a bigger, wider version of her brother’s. He knew deep down that there was a long-established rule that you treated your friends’ sisters as if they were icequeens, but it was a rule he found himself suddenly wanting to break.

‘Do you want me to?’ he drawled. ‘Looks pretty clean to me. Anyway, I don’t want to interrupt your swim.’

Sorcha shook her wet hair, but something about his hard, lean body was making her pulse race. ‘No, that’s fine. Don’t worry—I’ve finished now.’

There was a long pause while they stared at one another, and the teasing became something else, while something unknown shimmered on the air.

‘So, why don’t you get out?’

Did he guess that she was scared to? Because she could feel the tight tingle of desire which was rucking her swimsuit across her breasts and making the tips feel so hard that they hurt?

‘I will in a minute.’

‘Do you mind if I get in and join you?’ He put his hand to the first button on his jeans and shot her a questioning look, but the sight of her dark-eyed confusion made him relent just as Rupert came round the corner.

‘Cesare! There you are! Oh, I see you’ve met Sorcha. Hello, little sister—how are you?’

‘Very well,’ she said, biting her lip and dipping down into the water in the hope that its coolness might get rid of her embarrassed flush. ‘Considering that no one came to meet me at the station.’ But she was angry with herself, and with the black-eyed Italian for having made her feel…what?

Desire?

Longing?

She frosted him a look—which wasn’t easy on a boiling hot day when your hair was plastered to your head and your heart was racing so much that it felt as if it was going to leap out of your chest. ‘Cesare?’ she questioned acidly, wondering why the name sounded familiar.

‘Cesare di Arcangelo,’ he said. ‘Rupert and I were at school together.’

‘Remember I told you about the Italian who bowled women down like ninepins?’ laughed Rupert. ‘Owns banks and department stores all over Italy?’

‘No,’ answered Sorcha in a voice of icy repression. ‘I don’t believe I do. Rupert, would you mind handing me my towel?’

‘Please, allow me.’ Cesare had picked up the rather worn beachtowel and was handing it towards her, holding her gaze with his black eyes. Her coolness intrigued him, for he had never experienced it from a woman before, and her lack of eagerness hinted at a pride and self-possession which was all too rare.

‘Forgive me,’ he murmured as he held the towel out. ‘But I couldn’t resist teasing you.’ Yet his mockery had been deliberately sensual, and it had been wrong. He had noted her reluctant, embarrassed response—and now he could have kicked himself for subjecting a beautiful young woman to such an onslaught.

He sighed. Her mouth looked as if it were composed of two folded fragrant rose petals which he would have travelled the world to kiss. And he had behaved like some impacciato idiot.

And she is the sister of your friend—she is out of bounds.

‘Will you forgive me?’ he persisted.

He sounded as if it mattered, and Sorcha found she couldn’t hold out against what seemed to be genuine contrition in his eyes.

‘I might,’ she said tartly. ‘But you’ll have to make it up to me.’

He gave a low laugh. ‘And how will I go about doing that? Any ideas?’ he questioned innocently, and something passed between them at that moment which he had never felt before. The rocket. The thunderbolt. Colpo di fulmine. Some random and overwhelming outside force—a kind of unspoken understanding—which took the universe into the palm of a gigantic hand and began to spin it out of control.

‘I’ll…I’ll think of something,’ said Sorcha breathlessly.

‘Anything,’ he murmured, and at that moment he meant it. ‘And it’s yours.’

There was an odd kind of silence and then Sorcha hauled herself out of the pool in one fluid movement, water streaming down her long legs. Never had she been so conscious of her body as in the presence of this Italian.

‘Cesare’s come to cast his expert eye over the Robinsons’ latest business plan,’ said Rupert. ‘I’m hoping I might be able to persuade him to look at ours!’

The Robinsons were their nearest neighbours—fabulously rich, with four eligible sons—one of whom their sister Emma had been dating since her schooldays.

‘Does that mean I have to be nice to him?’ Sorcha asked.

Black eyes now mocked her. ‘Very.’

But as she draped the towel over her shoulders Cesare averted his eyes from the body which gleamed like a seal in the tight, wet swimsuit. And wasn’t it strange how the smallest courtesy could make you feel safe with a man who was danger personified?

‘Do you ride?’ she asked suddenly.

Cesare smiled. ‘Do I?’

That was how it started. He’d set off for the Robinsons first thing and return about lunchtime, and Sorcha would be waiting for him in the stables. He would saddle up and they would gallop out together over the lush fields. And the way her face lit up when she saw him would stab at his heart in a strange and painful way.

‘Bet Italy is never as green as this,’ she said one afternoon, when they had dismounted and their horses were grazing and she and Cesare were sitting—sweating slightly—beneath the shade of a big oka tree.

‘Umbria is very green,’ he said.

‘Is that where you live?’

‘It is where I consider home,’ he said, trying and failing not to be rapt by the distracting vision of her breasts thrusting against the fine silk of her riding shirt, her slim legs in jodhpurs and those long, sexy leather boots. He stifled a groan and shifted uncomfortably as she lay on her back, looking up at the leaves.

The air was different today. It felt thick and heavy—as if you could cut through it with a knife—and in the distance was the low murmur of approaching thunder. It reminded him of the storms back home, and the warmth of the soil and the pleasures of the flesh. Cesare could feel a rivulet of sweat trickle down his back, and suddenly he longed to feel her tongue tracing its meandering salty path.

‘Really?’ she questioned.

He blinked. Really, what? Oh, yes. The weather in Umbria—just what he wanted to talk about! ‘We have many storms close to Panicale, where I live—but that is why we have such fertile soil.’ Fertile. Now, why the hell was he thinking about that?

‘Have you always lived in Umbria?’ Sorcha persisted, because she wanted to know every single thing about him—what he liked for breakfast and what music he listened to, and where was the most beautiful place he’d ever been—‘Umbria, naturally,’ he had replied gravely.

‘No,’ he sighed, ‘I grew up in Rome.’

‘Tell me,’ she whispered.

What was it about women that made them want to tear your soul apart with their questions? And what was it about Sorcha that made him tell her? But he was spare with his facts—a houseful of servants and ever-changing nannies while his parents lived out their jet-set existence. A childhood he did not care to relive in his memory.

And suddenly he could bear it no longer. ‘You know that I am having difficulty behaving as a house-guest should behave?’ he questioned unsteadily.

Dreamily, Sorcha watched the shimmering canopy of leaves. ‘Oh?’

‘I want to kiss you.’

She sat up, oblivious to the creamy spill of her cleavage, or the effect it was having on him. On her face was an expression of a tight and bursting excitement—like a child who had just been given a big pile of presents to open.

‘Then kiss me. Please.’

He knew in that instant that she was innocent—though he had guessed at it before—and in a way it added to the intolerable weight of his desire, and his position here in the house.

‘You know what will happen if I do?’ he groaned.

‘Yes,’ she teased, in an effort to hide her longing, and her nervousness that she would somehow disappoint him—that somehow she wouldn’t know what to do. ‘Your lips will touch my lips and then—Oh! Oh, Cesare!’

‘Si!’ he murmured, as he caught her against him. ‘All those things and more. Many more.’ He pushed her to the ground and brushed his lips against hers, making a little sound of pleasure in the back of his throat as he coaxed hers into opening.

The kiss went on and on. He had never thought it was possible for a kiss to last so long—he felt he was drowning in it, submerging himself in its sweet potency. The blood pooled and hardened at his groin and he groaned again—only this time the sound was tinged with a sense of urgency.

‘Cesare!’ she breathed again, as his thumb circled against the tight, damp material which strained over her breast. ‘Oh, oh, oh!’

He sat up abruptly. This was wrong. Wrong. He sprang to his feet and held out his hand to her. ‘Let us move away from here!’ he ordered. ‘And where in the name of cielo is your mother?’

‘She’s up at the house—why?’

‘She is happy for you to ride with me alone every day?’ he demanded.

‘I think so.’

Did she not know of Cesare di Arcangelo’s reputation? he wondered. Did she not realise that women offered themselves to him every day of the week? And would she not be outraged if her daughter were to become just one more in a long line of conquests?

He looked at her, his eyes softening as he saw the bewilderment in hers. For Sorcha was not like the others. She was sweet and innocent.

‘Cesare?’ Sorcha questioned tentatively.

‘It is all right, cara mia. Do not frown—for you make lines on that beautiful face.’ He kissed the tip of her nose. ‘Let’s go and swim, and cool off.’

‘But Rupert’s down by the pool!’

‘Exactly,’ Cesare said grimly.

But once Cesare kissed Sorcha it was like discovering an addiction which had lain dormant in his body since puberty. It was the first time in his life that he had ever used restraint, but he quickly discovered that sexual frustration was a small price to pay for the slow and erotic discovery of her body. And that delayed sexual gratification was the biggest aphrodisiac in the world.

Sometimes he took pains to make sure that they weren’t alone together. And he quizzed her on her views so that sometimes Sorcha felt as if he was examining her and ticking off the answers as he went along.

He knew she had a place at university, and he knew that the experience would change her. And—maledizione!—was it not human nature for him not to want that?

The long, glorious summer stretched out like an elastic band, and they lived most of it outside. There were parties and dinners and a celebration for Sorcha’s exam results, which were even better than predicted, but soon the faint tang of autumn could be felt in the early morning air, and Cesare knew that he could not avoid the real world for ever.

‘I have to think about going back,’ he said heavily.

She clung to him. ‘Why?’

‘Because I must. I have stayed longer than I intended.’

‘Because of me?’ She slanted him a smile, but inside her heart was aching.

‘That is one of the reasons,’ he agreed evenly, pushing away the memory of the blonde who had told him she was pregnant. It had caused outrage when Cesare had demanded a paternity test, but his certainty that he was not the father had been proven.

He thought how easy it was with Sorcha—and how restful it had been to have a summer free of being hounded by predatory women on the make. He was twenty-six, and he knew that sooner or later he was going to have to settle down—but for the first time in his life he could actually see that it might have some advantages.

He was confused.

He wanted her, and yet to take her virginity would be too huge a responsibility, would abuse his position as guest.

He wanted her, but still he hesitated—because he wanted to savour the near-torture of abstinence, recognising that the wait had been so long and so exquisitely painful that nothing would ever feel this acute again.

He wanted her, and yet in his heart he knew that he could have her only at a huge price.

‘Oh, Sorcha,’ he groaned, and knew that he could not go on like this. ‘Siete cosi donna bella.’

He pulled her into his arms and began to kiss her, softly at first, and then seekingly—so that her lips opened like a shell, with her tongue the wet, precious pearl within.

With a savage groan he cupped her breast, feeling its lush, pert weight resting in the palm of his hand. He flicked his thumb against the hardening nipple and knew that with much more of this he would suckle her in full daylight. And what else?

‘We can’t stay here,’ he said grimly.

‘Let’s go inside,’ she begged.

He had held out for so long, until he was stretched to breaking point, and silently he took her hand and led her into the house, to the darkened study, whose windows were shuttered against the blinding sunlight.

They kissed frantically—hard and desperately—and suddenly Cesare’s hands were all over her in a way he’d never allowed them to be before. He pushed her down onto a leather couch. His hand was rucking up her dress, feeling her thighs part, and as he inched his thumb upwards she writhed in silent invitation.

He had just scraped aside her damp panties and pushed a finger into her sweet, sticky warmth when they heard the sound of a door slamming at the far end of the house. Sorcha sat bolt upright and stared at him with wide, frightened eyes. He pulled his hand away from her.

‘Merda!’ he swore softly. ‘Who is it?’

‘It must be my mother!’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Who else could it be?’

Hurriedly he smoothed his hands down over her ruffled hair and silently left the room, disappearing for the rest of the afternoon until just before pre-dinner drinks were served when he went to find her alone, sitting on the terrace, her face unhappy.

He knew that the timing was wrong—but he also knew that this must be said now. He felt as you sometimes did when you walked through the sticky mud of a ploughed field after a rainstorm. It was the price he knew must be paid for his body’s desire, and yet he was too het up to question whether it was too high.

‘Sorcha, will you be my wife?’

She stared at him. ‘What did you say?’ she whispered.

‘Will you marry me?’

Rocked and reeling with pure astonishment that such a question should have come out of the blue, Sorcha heard only the reluctance in his voice, and saw the strained expression on his face.

‘Why?’ She fed him the question like a stage stooge setting up the punchline, but he failed to deliver it.

‘Need you ask? You are accomplished and very beautiful, and you are intelligent and make me laugh. And as well as your many obvious attributes you are a virgin, and that is a rare prize in the world in which we live.’

‘A rare prize?’ she joked. ‘That matters to you?’

‘Of course it matters to me!’ His black eyes narrowed and his macho heritage came to the fore. ‘I want to possess you totally, utterly, Sorcha—in a way that no other man ever has nor ever will. And I think we have what it takes to make a successful marriage.’

He was talking about her as if she was something he could own or take over—like swallowing up a smaller company.

And it was the most damning answer he could have given. Sorcha was not yet nineteen and she hadn’t even begun to live. She was at an age where love was far more important than talking cold-bloodedly about a marriage’s chance of success. Yes, she had fallen in love with Cesare—but he had said nothing about loving her back. And how could she possibly marry him and give the rest of her life to him in those circumstances? And throw her hard-fought-for university education away into the bargain.

He would get over it—and so would she. Yes, it would hurt—but just imagine the pain of an inevitable failed marriage with a man who didn’t love her? That damning phrase came back to echo round in her head.

A rare prize.

She looked at him, masking her terrible hurt with an expression of pride.

‘No, Cesare,’ she said quietly. ‘I can’t marry you.’