Сара Крейвен – Paper Marriages: Wife: Bought and Paid For / His Convenient Marriage / A Convenient Wife (страница 4)
By the time they sat down to dinner that night, under Brownie’s beady eye, Penny knew she was in love for the first time in her life.
Penny leaned over the crib and marvelled at the baby boy. ‘He’s beautiful—he’s going to grow up to be a stunningly handsome man,’ she told the doting mother, Patricia, her friend Jane’s sister who had arrived from New York the day before. ‘Though maybe not as handsome as Solo,’ she sighed dreamily. Solo was never out of her thoughts—it had been the most perfect five weeks of her life.
‘You are besotted with that man.’ Jane laughed. ‘You mention his name just about every other sentence.’
‘I’m not that bad. Am I?’ Penny queried with a grin.
‘Do I smell romance in the air, Penny?’ Patricia interjected, touching the baby’s head. ‘He is asleep,’ she murmured before sitting down next to Penny on the sofa.
‘Maybe.’ Penny blushed; she could not help it.
‘And you should see him, Patricia,’ Jane cut in. ‘Tall, dark and handsome does not cover it, add rich and he is every girl’s dream.’
Patricia gave Penny a searching look. ‘He sounds too good to be true. I hope you’re being careful,’ she went on bluntly. ‘You don’t want to end up another statistic in the unmarried mothers list.’
Chance would be a fine thing, Penny thought wistfully. Solo had taken her out every weekend, and she had just about offered herself on a plate. But he had a lot more self-control than she did. He always called a halt before they went too far. She admired him for his strong principle, but it did not stop her aching in bed every night.
‘He is not like that,’ Penny defended. ‘He respects me.’
‘My, my,’ Patricia drawled teasingly. ‘The boy must be a paragon of virtue, if he does not want to get into your knickers.’
‘Please.’ Penny blushed scarlet again. ‘It is not like that.’
‘Unless of course he is a virgin like yourself,’ Patricia offered with a grin.
Jane spluttered, ‘He is no boy, and I’d bet my life savings he is no virgin,’ and went off into paroxysms of laughter.
Penny had never thought of Solo with another woman, but Jane’s words forced her to. Solo was a healthy, virile male, a lot older than she was; he was bound to have dated, even loved other women, and it hurt.
‘Do you mind?’ Penny snapped. ‘It is not a joke. Solo is the man I am going to marry.’
‘What?’ Jane exclaimed, her laughter vanishing. ‘The hunk has actually asked you?’
‘Well, almost,’ Penny amended, and did what she had been dying to do all week—she confided her secret hope to Jane and Patricia. ‘When Solo came down last Saturday, he had a talk with my father, but then his PA called him and he had to leave suddenly. But when I saw Solo out to his car, he said he had something very important to ask me when he got back. Plus all week my father has been grinning at me, as if he knows something I don’t.’ The relief at being able to share her excitement with her friends was heady. ‘Solo telephoned me yesterday. He is coming back tomorrow, and he has planned a special dinner in London for the two of us. What else could it all mean?’ she asked, turning sparkling eyes on her friends.
‘If you are right, this is serious,’ Patricia said bluntly. ‘You’re only eighteen.’
‘I’m nineteen next week,’ Penny said swiftly.
‘Even so, I thought you were going to Cambridge University with Jane.’
Shamefaced, Penny turned to Jane. ‘I know we are booked into the halls of residence together for the first year, but I really do love him.’ Then as another thought occurred to her a smile lightened her eyes, and she added, ‘Though maybe I can still go to university. Solo has his work, and he has to go abroad a lot. We haven’t discussed it, but we could probably live between here and Cambridge.’
‘Wait a minute.’ Patricia adopted her older-sister mode, hands on hips. ‘What’s his name? Where did you meet him? And what exactly does he do?’
‘His name is Solo Maffeiano, he is an Italian businessman and he is gorgeous,’ Penny began enthusiastically. ‘And I met him when Daddy invited him down on business. Daddy has sold him some of the farmland to develop, I think.’ But business was not Penny’s interest, Solo was, and she lifted her head, smiling, but was stunned by the look of horror on Patricia’s face.
‘Solo Maffeiano.
‘That’s his name,’ Penny said cautiously, a sense of unease curling her stomach. ‘Why, do you know him?’
‘I’ve met him once in New York. He’s tall, dark and very handsome but I know a lot about him. He dated Lisa, a partner in my husband’s law firm, for months. Lisa was madly in love with him and she thought he would marry her, so she was heartbroken when he finished with her four weeks ago.’
‘It can’t be the same man,’ Penny said stoutly. She had known him five weeks!
‘There could not be two Solo Maffeianos in the world. His financial acumen and his prowess with woman are legend.’
‘Yes, there could.’ Penny clung onto the hope.
‘Penny, the man is in the same line of business.’
‘Well, even if it is the same man, maybe he realised he didn’t truly love your friend. That is not his fault,’ she said, trying to defend Solo.
‘If that was all, maybe not,’ Patricia said soberly. ‘But when Lisa received a goodbye gift of roses and a diamond pin, she called him and discovered he had not even sent them but his PA. Tina Jenson. How low is that?’
Penny felt her heart shrivel in her chest at the mention of Tina Jenson. Patricia was right—it had to be the same Solo. ‘Maybe he didn’t have time,’ she said faintly, but she was clutching at straws and she knew it.
‘Oh, you poor kid, Penny. What have you got into? According to Lisa, Solo Maffeiano is a ruthless, powerful man. Nobody knows much about his early years, just that he had made his first million by the time he was twenty-two, and nobody asks too closely how! In fact, rumour has it Tina, his American PA, is his permanent lover. The only reason they are not married is she has a husband tucked away somewhere who won’t divorce her.’
Penny felt the blood drain from her face. ‘No. I don’t believe it.’
‘Penny, you’re young,’ Patricia said gently ‘Maybe you’re right and Solo Maffeiano is totally genuine in his feelings for you, but the man is too old for you. Give yourself time. Don’t be rushed into marriage. You said Solo has bought some of your father’s land. How do you know he is not after the house and park as well?’
‘No… I don’t know, but he is not too old for me.’ she ended defiantly, wishing she had never come to visit Jane today and never heard Patricia’s denouncement of Solo.
‘Do me a favour, Penny. If Maffeiano does ask you to marry him, take your time before making a decision. You are an intelligent girl, with your whole future before you, a pedigree a mile long, and you stand to inherit a very desirable property.’
‘Rubbish, nobody cares about things like that any more,’ Penny exploded.
‘Your stepmother Veronica does, and I think a man like Solo Maffeiano does as well. Promise me, before you do anything drastic you will at least start at university.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ Penny murmured in a very subdued voice.
‘If the man loves you, Penny, he won’t mind.’
‘Who loves our little Penny?’ Simon burst into the room. ‘Besides me,’ he teased. Tall, tanned with blond hair, he grinned at the three women.
‘Oh, shut up, Simon and get out,’ Jane snapped.
Penny got to her feet. ‘No.’ She glanced at Simon. ‘Stay. I have to go.’
‘I’ll see you out.’ Jane jumped up, and, once in the hall of the vicarage, Jane put an arm around Penny’s shoulder. ‘Don’t worry about university or me. Talk to Solo—I’m sure it will be fine. You know Patricia, she always was a terrible gossip. You don’t have to believe everything she tells you.’
The sun was shining, it was a beautiful warm September afternoon, but to Penny the world had turned grey as she set off walking through the village, a deep frown marring her lovely features. She needed to think, and, turning, she trekked across the fields towards home.
Solo with another woman. She examined the thought and she didn’t like it. He had finished with the woman within a week of meeting Penny, which she could just about get over. But what Patricia had said about Tina Jenson she could not dismiss quite so easily. Penny had only met the woman once, and she had taken Tina’s position as Solo’s PA at face value.
Solo had hinted to Penny he wanted to marry her, and she would stake her life on him being sincere. She loved him with all her heart. Was she really going to let Patricia’s vague rumours and gossip spoil the love and trust she had in Solo?
No, she finally decided with the optimism of youth. Tomorrow Solo would be here and everything would be fine, and, holding that thought, she hurried on home.
Penny saw the black car as soon as she walked around the corner of the house. It was Solo’s—he had come back early, and her confidence in his love rose sky high. She heard voices as she passed the open window of the drawing room, and paused. But it was the ‘Solo, darling really!’ that stopped her in her tracks.
She leant against the warm stone wall beneath the window, unable to move, and for once grateful for her lack of height. She had only heard the voice once before but it was unmistakably Tina Jenson.