Carol Marinelli – Her Passionate Italian: The Passion Bargain / A Sicilian Husband / The Italian's Marriage Bargain (страница 3)

Oh, stop it, she thought and tossed her cellphone onto the table then sat back in her seat and closed her eyes to work very hard at building Angelo’s beloved golden image over the top of the darker one that should not have found a way into her head at all!

Angelo didn’t have a dark corner in him. He was all sunlight. Golden skin, golden eyes and fine golden strands streaking in his tawny hair that she so loved to trail her fingers through. When he walked into a room he didn’t cast a long shadow over everyone else, he lit it up with his warm golden temperament that had not yet become hidden beneath a hard, sophisticated shell. When he looked at her she felt warm and loved and beautiful, not—invaded by dark, untrammelled lusts.

Oh, all right, so she admitted it. Sometimes she’d wondered why their relationship wasn’t more passionate. In fact, they had yet to actually make love.

‘Time for that when you’re ready,’ she could hear his gentle voice saying.

And he was right because she wasn’t ready. He’d understoodfrom the beginning that she needed time to get used to the idea of full physical love. It wasn’t that she was frigid, she quickly assured herself, just—wary of the unknown.

It came from being brought up by a deeply religious and straight-laced mother who’d instilled in her daughter standards by which she expected Francesca to live her life. Those standards included the sanctity of marriage coming before any pleasures of the flesh.

Outmoded principles? Yes, of course, principles like those were so out of fashion they could appear almost laughable to some. Indeed Sonya, her best friend and flatmate, did laugh at her—often. Sonya couldn’t believe that a gorgeous masculine specimen like Angelo put up with a shrinking violet from a different century.

‘You must be mad to play Russian roulette with a man like him,’ she’d told her. ‘Aren’t you terrified that he might take his sexual requirements somewhere else?’

Well, yes, sometimes. She’d even confided those concerns to Angelo. He’d just smiled and kissed her, said Sonya was jealous and she wouldn’t recognise a principle if she was staring at one.

Angelo didn’t like Sonya. Sonya could not stand him. They provoked each other like two enemies across a neutral zone. Francesca was the neutral zone. The old-fashioned girl with the old-fashioned principles who loved them both but—more to the point—they loved her.

A smile crossed her mouth again. It wasn’t quite as sunny as the smile she had been wearing before she ran into Carlo Carlucci but at least it was a smile.

Her telephone beeped, she twisted it around to check who was calling and the smile became a rueful grin. ‘Were your ears burning?’ she quizzed.

‘Meaning what?’ Sonya demanded, then sourly before Francesca could offer an answer, ‘I suppose by that you’re somewhere with darling Angelo and he’s slandering my character again.’

‘No,’ Francesca denied. ‘Angelo’s in Milan today so put your claws away and tell me what you’re ringing me for.’

‘Do I only ring you when I want something?’

‘The honest answer to that is—yes,’ Francesca answered drily.

‘Well, not this time,’ her flatmate countered. ‘I got up this morning to find you’d already left the flat. Why are you out so early? This is supposed to be your day off.’

‘And you should be on your way to work by now.’ Francesca took a quick glance at her watch. ‘What time did you crawl into bed this morning?’ It was definitely long after she had fallen fast asleep.

Her answer was a mind-your-own-business tut. ‘Stick to the point,’ Sonya snapped. ‘Where are you going and how long will you be gone for?’

‘I decided to come into town and do my shopping before it gets too hot and sticky to try on clothes.’

‘Oh, I forgot. It’s find-the-right-dress-to-knock-dear-Angelo’s-eyes-out day.’

She really was obsessing on the man. ‘Oh, do stop it, Sonya,’ she sighed impatiently. ‘Have you any idea how wearing this war between you and Angelo is? I hope you’re going to call a truce before the party on Saturday night or I might just knock your heads together in front of Rome’s best.’

‘Maybe you would prefer it if I stayed away altogether—then you won’t have to worry.’

She was offended now. Francesca uttered another sigh. ‘Now, that’s plain childish.’

‘And you are beginning to sound like my mother. Don’t do this, don’t do that. At least try to behave yourself,’ Sonya chanted deridingly. ‘I hoped when I came to Rome that I would leave all of that stuff behind me in London.’

She was right, Francesca realised with a start—she sounded like her own mother. ‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured heavily.

‘Forget it,’ Sonya said and it was her turn to sigh. ‘I’m a bitch in the mornings. You know I am. Go and buy your knockout dress and I’ll crawl into work like a good girl.’

The call ended a few seconds later, leaving Francesca sitting there frowning and wondering what the heck had happened to her beautiful day.

The answer to that came in the form of a pair of dark eyes and a sensually husky voice saying, ‘Have coffee with me at the Café Milan.’

A sudden breeze whipped up, swirling its way around the square, flipping tablecloths and shifting lightweight chairs. Francesca’s hair was whipped backwards, her skin hit by a shivery chill. Then it was gone, leaving waiters hurrying to make good the disarray the breeze had left behind it and Francesca feeling as if she had just been touched by an ill wind.

She got up, took some money from her tote bag and placed it on the table to pay for her drink. As she walked back across the square to where she’d left the Vespa her skin was still covered in goose pimples yet she was trembling not shivering. She felt the difference so deeply it was almost an omen in itself.

CHAPTER TWO

IT WAS gone lunchtime by the time she arrived back at the apartment. As she stepped in through the door she then stood for a moment just looking around her in frowning puzzlement. The place had been quite tidy when she’d left here this morning but it didn’t look like that now. The cushions on the sofa were crushed and tumbled. There were two half-drunk coffee-cups sitting on the low table and an empty bottle of wine with two glasses lying on their sides on the floor. She could see through the open door to Sonya’s bedroom that it looked pretty much in the same tumbled state.

She was still frowning at the mess when her cellphone beeped and, placing her shopping bags on the floor, she fished out her phone to discover the caller was Bianca, the office manager of the tour group she and Sonya worked for.

She was looking for Sonya. ‘She didn’t turn up to work today,’ Bianca announced. ‘Have you any idea where she is? She isn’t answering her mobile or the phone at your flat.’

Looking around at the evidence, Francesca could only assume that Sonya had been entertaining an unexpected visitor, though her loyalty to Sonya was not going to let her tell Bianca that.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘but I left the flat before Sonya was up this morning so I’ve no idea where she is,’ which wasn’t a lie. ‘Didn’t she call in to warn you she wasn’t going to make it?’

‘No.’ The manager’s voice was tight. ‘And she’s left me a guide short. It really isn’t on, Francesca. This is the third time in two weeks she’s let me down like this.’

It was? Francesca’s eyes widened at this surprise piece of information. She hadn’t been aware that Sonya had been skipping off work. ‘I know she’s been suffering with a troublesome wisdom tooth lately,’ which was true. Sonya complained about it a lot but was terror-struck at the mere mention of the word dentist. ‘Maybe she couldn’t stand the pain any more and went to get treatment.’

‘And pigs might fly,’ Bianca snapped. ‘It’s this man she has been seeing.’

Man? ‘What man?’ As far as she was aware, Sonya wasn’t seeing anyone special at the moment.

‘Don’t pull the innocent, Francesca,’ Bianca scolded. ‘You know all about the married man she’s lost her head over. If she’s any sense she will drop him before this company drops her. I can’t have my guides not turning up when they should. It makes an absolute mess of my…’

Francesca stopped listening, so stunned by the turn of this conversation that she had to sit down. She’d known Sonya since they’d been at university together and—OK, she acknowledged, so she was a bit of a rebel and tended to let her heart rule her head. But she confided most things to Francesca and she did not recall her saying a thing about a new man.

A married man?

Bianca had to be mistaken, she decided, only to look at the evidence laid out in front of her eyes that told her Sonya was up to something clandestine if she was resorting to skipping work so she could entertain her man here, where there was little chance of them being seen together.

‘I’ll come in and cover for her if you need me.’ She cut across whatever it was Bianca was saying. She glanced at her watch. ‘I still have time to get there if it will help you out.’

‘Are you sure you don’t mind? You were supposed to be shopping for your dress today. It doesn’t seem fair that you should—’

‘The dress is bought,’ Francesca assured, glancing across the room to where she’d placed the elegant dress box that she’d ridden back here safely trapped between her legs. ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can make it.’