SARA WOOD – A Passionate Revenge (страница 2)

Dark eyes stone-cold with ruthless intent, he started up the car and swung out into Cottage Lane, heading for his office in London.

Anna knelt on the garden path, her capable fingers busily tweaking out weeds from the colourful herbaceous borders of the typically English cottage garden.

Sitting back to review the results of her labours, she couldn’t help but be struck by the contrast with the magnificent gardens of Stanford House, where she’d once lived. This little patch in the front garden was all she had now. Ten feet by six. A far cry from the acres where she’d once roamed, a lonely, unloved—and unlovely—girl.

Almost unthinkingly, her muddy fingers went to her nose. Now it was a normal size and fitted her face properly. She smiled with gentle pleasure.

But being ugly had left her a lasting legacy. She was even more careful not to reveal her feelings to anyone. The episode with Vido had cured her of that.

Anna frowned and tackled a stubborn dock root with grim determination, pushing back the pain that had leapt to squeeze her heart like a vice. Why open old wounds? Sure she’d loved him, madly, wildly, deeply, although she hadn’t dared say so in case he’d laughed at her temerity. After all, he’d been the most popular boy in school and she’d been—what had those girls said?—a hideous little bat.

OK, he’d kissed her several times, and she’d hardly been able to believe her luck. But her grandfather and the girls at school had told her why he was dating her. He was ambitious as hell and she was an heiress. Why else would an Adonis suck up to someone as hideous as her?

She bit her lip, suffering once again the hard nails of painful truth. Her world had come crashing about her ears that day when she’d been forced to accept that Vido was just a callous fortune-hunter. She’d been a means to an end. Nothing more.

Anna frowned. He was yesterday’s news. Soon she’d be married and she’d be able to forget her hurt and the lack of self-esteem that still haunted her.

Thankfully, her fiancé, Peter, liked her silences and her quiet reserve. He hated emotional, demonstrative women. And she was lucky to have found someone who appreciated her qualities. A matter-of-fact and rather cool man, who was very attentive but didn’t arouse horrible, uncontrollable longings that scared her with their raw intensity.

A screech of brakes came from the lane and then the sound of a reversing car, but she paid no attention. When Stanford House had been sold, precipitating her grandfather’s stroke, she’d taken over the nearby cottage that in better times had belonged to their gardener.

It was situated only two hundred yards from the beautiful old farmhouse where Shakespeare’s wife, Anne Hathaway, had been born. Passing tourists often stopped to admire and photograph her tiny black and white timbered cottage with its picturesque thatched roof, too.

Wistfully she mused that it would be nice if her grandfather could appreciate the cottage’s charm. But it was unlikely. He had railed against his bankruptcy and hated what he called ‘coming down in the world’.

It wasn’t surprising that he’d had a stroke. Her heart went out to him. He’d changed from being a gruff and domineering man and now looked helpless and frightened. She decided to pick him some flowers. Hopefully there would be better news about him when she next visited.

Tensely Vido glowered at the woman’s slender back and the mass of gleaming black hair. Even after ten years, Anna’s spectacular body was unmistakable. So were his conflicting emotions.

He felt shaken by his reaction at seeing Anna. A devastating mix of need and loathing had hurtled unchecked through his body, filling him with fury that he could actually lust after such a mean-spirited woman. He shouldn’t feel like this. Not after all this time.

‘Ogling the local peasantry isn’t your style,’ murmured Camilla in amusement.

He took in a long breath to steady the cascading waterfall of feelings that had knocked him off balance. Hell. Why should his guts melt at the sight of the woman? Had Anna’s blistering scorn turned him into a masochist? Or a pervert? Was he really aroused by a woman who despised him? He scowled. He just wanted to be normal. To fall in love. Have kids.

‘I think that’s Anna,’ he said, managing to find a clipped tone.

‘Oh. Well, if you’re going to give her a tongue-lashing, make it quick.’

Camilla looked at him fondly and touched his arm. It took all his will-power not to push her hand away and he was appalled by his irrational response to her affectionate gesture.

‘I just want a word or two,’ he pushed out.

With difficulty he conquered the evil little voice in his head that told him he wanted a devil of a lot more than that. Seeing Anna had kick-started his dormant libido into life. And how! Every bone he possessed ached to have Anna sighing beneath him. For that fabulous body to be arching with pleasure.

His eyes blazed with an intense anger as he sought to crush the sexual hunger that had hit him like a hammer blow. Common sense told him that his emotional wires had become crossed. It was said that you never forgot your first love and, hell, was that true with him.

This was the spiteful little cat who’d called him promiscuous and asked coldly if he intended to infect every female in the county with some sexual disease. She’d hurled insults at him till he’d reeled. And had deliberately made him into a criminal in everyone’s eyes. Maledizione!

With his malevolent gaze on her, his body fired with lust and loathing, he made himself saunter slowly to the picket fence. Oblivious of him, she continued to weed the handkerchief-sized front garden.

After a moment she straightened, still with her back to him. His stomach cramped. Her figure was even more womanly than before. Long, slender legs, tanned to a soft gold, the skin gleaming and flawless. Curvy hips. Tiny rear squashed temptingly in a pair of too-tight shorts that defined each buttock. Neat waist…

All too vividly he remembered being teased by his amused friends who’d suggested he put a bag over her head so he could enjoy the rest of her admittedly great body.

But because of her reserve, she had never let him anywhere near those proud, high breasts. The sublime length of those smooth legs had never wrapped around him seductively, as they had in his wild dreams.

Impatiently he struggled to master his destructive passions. His priority was to deal with the cloud that was hanging over the Pascali name. She was living yards from where he meant to set up his business. That could mean trouble. If word got around that his character was suspect, it would seriously affect his business. She could do a great deal of harm with her wicked little tongue.

The liquid sound of birdsong filled the air. He could feel the atmosphere thickening as his simmering hatred continued to pour out in her direction.

After a moment his aggression imprinted itself on her. He wasn’t surprised. His loathing could have pulverised a tank.

Stiffening, she turned around warily. Her response was all that he could have wanted.

‘Vido!’ she gasped in horror.

Stunned at seeing him, she shrank back, thrown almost off balance by the sheer physical threat that emanated from his angry body. And something else even more devastating. He was projecting a raw and primitive sexuality that slammed into her gut and left her weak and breathless.

But it meant nothing. He’d always been testosterone on legs. A highly sexed male who treated women as objects for his pleasure. Her fear turned to scorn and the fine bones of her face grew taut with contempt.

Shock went through him too in violent waves, though for a different reason entirely. Expert plastic surgery had transformed her face and now she looked heart-stoppingly beautiful. All he wanted to do was to gaze at her as if he were still a lovesick fool, until the dizziness in his head subsided.

Her skin glowed with a healthy tan, her huge grey eyes sparkled. A blast of heat shot through him. A delicious feeling and one he’d forgotten.

And then her hand covered her nose as it always had whenever anyone had looked at her. His heart jerked. The gesture made him feel profoundly protective of her again, all the old sympathies crowding in on him in a swell of compassion. Grimly he reminded himself that they were wasted on her.

Once he’d believed that she’d been a poor little rich girl with no one to love her. With her parents dead and her grandfather showing her no affection, he’d felt anger on her behalf. But not for long.

His lip curled. It had been her unlovable temperament that had left her bereft of friends. She’d inherited her grandfather’s cold and unfeeling nature; his hatred of his fellow man—and woman. He scowled. Whatever physical alterations Anna had made on the outside, she wouldn’t have changed her malicious inner nature.

‘Anna,’ he said, his voice harsh with dislike. ‘What a surprise.’

She gulped visibly and couldn’t find anything witty or pithy to say. ‘Yes.’

Vido folded his arms, adopting a dominant pose. Anna found it hard not to be intimidated. Harder still to ignore the fizz of excitement that had ripped through her in response to the simmering darkness of his hot, assessing eyes. But she couldn’t prevent the worrying throb of pulses in a place she’d believed to be immune to stimulation.