The Italian Millionaire’s Marriage Read online

  ‘Good grief!’ Marco murmured. ‘What-’

  Lucci advanced to greet them with outstretched arms. After kissing Harriet on both cheeks, he sprang his surprise.

  ‘Meet Ginetta, my wife,’ he said. ‘We married on impulse, and you’re the first to know.’

  Marco maintained his composure, greeting the new Signora Lucci with perfect courtesy, but Harriet could imagine his thoughts. Elvino was at least thirty years older than his bride, and clearly took pleasure in buying her jewels. She was loaded down with them.

  There was another shock awaiting. Marco had described Lucci as a man of old-fashioned values, but now Ginetta gave the orders, and her idea of how to accommodate an engaged couple was modern. While not going so far as to put them in the same room she’d given them adjoining rooms with a connecting door.

  ‘We’ll be waiting downstairs when you’ve freshened up,’ she cooed, tripping daintily away.

  When she’d gone Marco knocked on Harriet’s door before entering.

  ‘I hope you realise that I had no idea of this,’ he said. ‘I never meant to break my word to you.’

  ‘I know that. You’re not responsible for them putting us together.’

  ‘Whatever is Lucci thinking of?’

  ‘He’s in love with her, that’s obvious.’

  ‘To think of him springing it on me! This visit is going to be an ordeal.’

  At first Harriet thought the same, but it wasn’t long before she began to like Ginetta, who seemed genuinely fond of her elderly husband, if not as besotted by him as he was by her. She also had a habit of making apparently naïve remarks that turned out, on examination, to be shrewd and witty. Several times over dinner Harriet found herself laughing.

  After the meal Ginetta insisted on showing her over the villa, innocently proud of its luxury and her own good fortune in securing a husband who could lavish gifts on her. Even so, her happiness had a cloud.

  ‘I’m really glad you came,’ she confided. ‘I made Vinni absolutely promise to get you here. Lots of wives don’t want to know me.’

  ‘I can’t think why,’ Harriet said warmly. ‘I think you’re great fun. But I’m not Marco’s wife, you know.’

  ‘But you soon will be. He’s nuts about you, anyone can see that.’

  Harriet gave a little laugh that sounded odd to herself. ‘It’s not Marco’s way to be “nuts”. And if he was he’d die rather than admit it.’

  ‘It’s just there in the way he looks at you, when you’re not looking back. He does it all the time. He can’t stop himself.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ Harriet said, colouring.

  ‘It’s true. And you do it, too.’

  ‘I-’

  ‘Yes, you do. You two fancy each other like crazy. It’s a good thing I gave you connecting rooms.’

  It was fortunate that she tripped away, calling back, ‘Come on, let’s find the men,’ because Harriet wouldn’t have known how to answer.

  The men were sitting on the broad terrace that overlooked the lake, drinking brandy and deep in discussion. Harriet could see that Marco was displeased, although controlling it beneath a courteous front. Both men rose to greet them. Elvino ordered more champagne and they all strolled along the terrace, watching the moonlight on the water.

  This joyful man bore no relation at all to the severe, practical ‘brain’ Marco had described, and which he clearly admired. He was triumphant in his happiness, wanting everyone to share it, laughing and kissing Ginetta repeatedly.

  ‘This is truly a house of love,’ he declared exuberantly, ‘since it houses two pairs of lovers. I drink to your coming wedding, I drink to your wedding night, I drink to all the pleasure you will take in each other-’

  ‘Caro,’ Ginetta giggled.

  ‘Oh, they don’t mind. They’re lovers, as we are.’ He was becoming jollier with every glass, and there was no stopping him now. ‘Come Marco, drink with me to the woman you love.’

  Harriet could hardly look at Marco, guessing how he would regard such a boisterous display. But he said quietly, ‘You are right, my friend. Let us drink.’

  He raised his glass in Harriet’s direction, she raised hers, and they clinked.

  ‘Don’t just drink to the girl,’ Elvino bawled. ‘Kiss her, and then kiss her again. And let your kisses be a pledge of the passion to come.’

  To demonstrate his point he tightened the arm that was about Ginetta’s shoulders, and gave her a smacking kiss. Marco responded by drawing Harriet close and laying his lips on hers. For a moment she raised her hands against him. She didn’t want to kiss him like this, knowing he’d been forced by politeness, and when he’d been at such pains to assure her that he would keep his distance.

  His lips lay lightly on hers, but that was somehow more unnerving than the night she’d sensed his fierce desire. He took her hand, still raised in an instinctive gesture of resistance.

  ‘Kiss me back,’ he murmured against her lips. ‘Make it look good.’

  Make it look good for the client, she thought angrily. But her hand was already reaching up to touch his face, while the other arm wound its way around him. His own arms tightened, drawing her very close. His lips moved across hers, subtly enticing, almost the ghost of a kiss, but a ghost that was enfolding her in a mysterious spell. She let herself slip into that spell easily, for now it was all right to caress his face and press against him, putting her whole heart and soul into what she was doing. He need never know. She was merely helping him keep a client happy.

  Marco too played his part with conviction, slipping an arm beneath her neck and kissing her with a kind of dreamy absorption that she thought must delude anybody. Except her. The slow movement of his lips over hers was sweet, blissful, and the temptation to believe in it was overpowering. She opened her eyes to find his face hovering close, his eyes fixed on her with a kind of astonishment. He was breathing unevenly.

  From Elvino came another burst of delight. ‘That’s the spirit,’ he bawled. ‘And now there’s only one thing to do-carry the lady upstairs.’

  On the word he lifted Ginetta and began to walk along the terrace, calling, ‘Time for lovers to go to bed,’ over his shoulder.

  Marco didn’t hesitate, and the next moment Harriet found herself lifted against his chest. She clung to him dizzily, confused as to how to get her bearings, but not really wanting to.

  Elvino reached the top of the stairs first and stopped to wait for them.

  ‘This is the way to live,’ he said blissfully. ‘Oh, I know that’s not what I used to say, but I’m wiser now. So are you, eh, my boy?’

  ‘You were always a wise man, Lucci,’ Marco murmured diplomatically.

  ‘Goodnight, goodnight-’ His voice drifted away along the corridor.

  But at the last minute he turned, just as Marco reached Harriet’s bedroom door. The old man’s eyes glinted with fun as Harriet turned the handle and Marco carried her in. She could feel him trembling, as she was herself.

  Once inside he set her down and closed the door.

  ‘You’d better lock it,’ she said in a shaking voice that was half-laughter and half-excitement. ‘I wouldn’t put it past him to bounce in to see if we’re living up to his expectations.’

  ‘Harriet, please-let me apologise for-everything. I never meant to embarrass you like this-’

  ‘I’m not embarrassed. I like him. Don’t you?’

  ‘I don’t know any more. I used to respect him. There wasn’t a shrewder brain anywhere-now I can’t think what’s gotten into him.’

  ‘No,’ she said wryly. ‘I don’t suppose you can.’

  ‘He’s always been so sane and level-headed.’

  ‘Well, maybe he thinks being sane and level-headed is overrated. Marco, he’s happy. Don’t you realise that?’

  She smiled, willing him to lighten up.

  ‘Happy!’ Marco said scathingly.

  ‘It’s generally considered a good thing to be.’

  He began to stride about the room. �
�And what happens when she betrays him?’

  ‘Maybe she never will. Yes, I’m sure she married for security, but I think she’s got a kind heart. She’s nice to him.’

  ‘She leads him by the nose, makes him her slave-’

  ‘No, he makes himself her slave, because he loves her.’

  ‘That’s one way of putting it.’

  ‘You don’t think much of love, do you, Marco?’

  ‘You’re unjust to me,’ he said after a moment. ‘I think love has its place, but I don’t like the kind of infatuation that makes a man behave like an imbecile.’

  ‘Or woman?’

  ‘Oh, no! Women are always one jump ahead, as Signora Lucci more than proves.’

  ‘That’s the most disgusting prejudice I ever heard. Women do make idiots of themselves over men-’

  ‘You never felt it necessary. It’s one of the things I’ve always admired about you. Your level head. Even that tomfool performance we had to put on out there didn’t faze you.’

  ‘Shut up!’ she breathed. ‘Shut up, shut up!’ If she had to hear any more of this she would go mad.

  ‘I apologise if I was being rude-’

  ‘And stop apologising!’ She took a long breath and pulled herself together. ‘We’re getting off the subject. There’s nothing wrong with acting like an imbecile for the right person. If people really love, they don’t care about that-’

  ‘God help them then!’ he said violently. ‘And God help Lucci for acting like a fool!’

  ‘But he’s a happy fool.’

  Marco stopped pacing and gave her a strange look. ‘That’s just sentimental talk, Harriet. It sounds good but it means nothing. No fool is really happy, because sooner or later he sees his folly and is ashamed of it. Then he wishes he’d never met her.’

  ‘You’re wrong about Elvino,’ Harriet said fervently. ‘He’ll never be sorry he met Ginetta because even if he loses his happiness he’ll still have had it. If he was wise, like you think he should be, he’d end up with nothing at all.’

  His face was bleak. ‘Better to have nothing than shame and bitterness.’

  She sighed. ‘Well, how do you choose between them? The man who believes in someone he loves, even if it makes him a little absurd, or the man who won’t let himself believe in anyone? Who’s the real fool, I wonder?’

  He gave a hard little laugh. ‘You mean me, don’t you? Stop trying to analyse me, Harriet, you don’t know enough.’

  ‘Then tell me the rest,’ she pleaded.

  ‘It’s not important,’ he said impatiently. ‘I am as I am. I can’t change now.’

  ‘That’s the sad part. You have just so much to give, and no more.’

  He went a little pale. ‘I give all I can.’

  ‘I know. But it isn’t very much, is it?’

  He was silent for a long moment, turning away to the window. When he turned back he said, ‘You think badly of me because I don’t fall over myself to endorse Lucci’s idiocy. Well, consider this. He brought me here to help him hand over half his fortune to that little gold-digger.’

  ‘She’s his wife and she’s making him happy,’ Harriet said desperately. She felt as if she was banging her head against stone. Like his heart.

  ‘He has four children who are going to lose half of their inheritance, only they don’t know it yet. The lawyer’s coming tomorrow, and he and I between us are supposed to connive at this disgrace. Plus I’ve broken a professional confidence by telling you.’

  ‘You can trust me.’

  ‘I never doubted that for a moment.’

  It was lucky he’d turned back to the window or he might have seen the painful look that crossed her face. Her fiancé trusted her with his professional secrets. From a man with such a strong code of ethics it was high praise, but not the kind she longed for.

  ‘It’s late,’ she said sadly. ‘And I’m tired.’

  ‘Then I won’t keep you up any longer.’ He opened the connecting door. ‘Don’t forget to lock this behind me,’ he said with an attempt at lightness.

  She matched his tone. ‘Do I need to?’

  ‘I wouldn’t put it past Lucci to send an army in here to make sure I “do my duty”. Goodnight, Harriet.’

  She undressed and lay in the darkness, every inch of her aware and aching with longing. Elvino’s romantic insistence on love at all costs had left her fired up, ready for something to happen.

  Tonight she and Marco had talked of one thing while seeming to talk about another and the end of it was that she was no closer to him in any way that mattered. Just in one way.

  You two fancy each other like crazy.

  It was almost funny that Ginetta had spotted the strong physical attraction that she felt for him and that he, she was sure, felt for her. He couldn’t love her but he wanted her. If he had his free choice now he would come to her bed.

  But he had no free choice. He’d blocked it off with promises. He was a man of his word, and would resist what he saw as a weakness.

  How badly did he want her?

  She could hear him walking back and forth on the other side of the door.

  Badly enough to break his word?

  His footsteps stopped, then resumed again.

  Badly enough to risk looking weak in his own eyes?

  Silence. The footsteps had stopped right next to the door.

  Holding her breath, Harriet kept her eyes fixed on the handle, which she could just see in the moonlight.

  Very slowly it moved. There was the faintest noise as the door was opened a fraction, perhaps half an inch. Then it stopped.

  She waited for it to move again, to open. She couldn’t breathe. She could almost feel the air vibrating with the tormented indecision of the man on the other side. But he would come to her because she willed it so fiercely.

  But then the incredible happened. Instead of opening further the door moved back, closing the tiny gap, and the handle was softly returned into place.

  After that there was silence.

  CHAPTER NINE

  I T WAS a relief to spend a few days in the Vatican museum. Absorbed in the world that had always sustained her, Harriet thought she would soon be able to forget Corzena.

  But the talisman failed this time. Halfway through a fourteenth-century parchment she would find herself thinking of the door that had so nearly opened, and then closed.

  Closed against her. That was the thing that hurt. Marco had tested the door just far enough to discover that she’d left it open for him. Then he had rejected her. What message could be clearer?

  From their manner to each other on the drive home nobody could have discerned anything in the air. For him, there probably hadn’t been, she thought bitterly.

  She returned home on the third evening to find Lucia eagerly looking for her.

  ‘Your father called,’ she said. ‘They’re back, and so anxious to see you. We’re all three invited to dine tomorrow night. I tried to call you and Marco but you both had your phones switched off. So I said yes for us all. Did I do right?’

  ‘Of course. My father! How did he sound?’

  ‘Thrilled by your engagement. He’s longing to see you. I found him almost likeable. I’m sorry, cara, I know he’s your father, but there it is. But if he’s good to you, I forgive him everything.’

  Marco arrived for supper and heard the whole story.

  ‘It makes a tight schedule now we’re so busy getting ready to go to Venice for the weddings,’ Lucia observed. ‘But when I suggested putting it off until we returned he was most insistent that it must be tomorrow. Still, it’s natural that he should be eager to see you.’

  ‘It’s a tighter schedule than you know,’ Marco said. ‘After tonight I was planning to sleep at my office to get through everything that needs doing before we leave for Venice.’

  ‘I suppose you could always ask your uncle and Guido to delay their weddings?’ Harriet suggested in the satirical tone she often used to him.

  ‘True,’ Marc
o said, appearing to consider this seriously. ‘But they’re so unreasonable that they’d probably put their weddings before my clients.’

  He smiled at her to show that he was sharing the joke. Harriet wondered if she really had been joking. This was the first time she’d seen him since Corzena, and he’d just told her that after tomorrow she wouldn’t see him again for days. To her dismay she discovered that it was a relief.

  To cheer herself up she concentrated on the thought of her father.

  ‘Tell me everything he said,’ she begged Lucia.

  ‘Again? All right, cara, I understand. He asked after you many times, were you well, were you happy in your engagement, could he give you to Marco with an easy mind? All the questions a loving father asks.’

  ‘And which he’s waited a very long time to ask,’ Marco said drily. ‘I wonder what lies behind this.’

  ‘Does my father’s interest need an explanation?’ Harriet flashed.

  ‘His sudden interest does.’

  ‘I’m engaged. Isn’t that enough?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose so. Now, it’s late and I must be going.’

  She treated herself to a new gown for the following evening, elegant, figure-hugging black silk that made a perfect setting for Marco’s gift of a diamond tiara. The hairdresser settled it into her upswept hair.

  She touched the diamonds, feeling how cold they were: as cold as his attempt to spoil the evening in advance by his sceptical remarks about her father. But why should he have done so? she wondered. He could be hard, unfeeling, but this had felt like a deliberate attempt to hurt her.

  She and Lucia were to travel together in the chauffeur-driven car, while Marco drove straight there from work. The d’Estinos lived in Rome’s most fashionable quarter, near St Peter’s, in a street where most of the other buildings were embassies. As they arrived they could see Marco getting out of his own car. He glanced at Harriet’s magnificence and nodded.