Exotic Affairs: The Mistress Bride\The Spanish Husband\The Bellini Bride (43 page)

Arrogance abounded. Antonia would have just loved
to hear his father say those words. ‘She’s what I want.’ He stated it simply. Then he sat forward and looked his father directly in the eye. ‘She is what I intend to have,’ he extended with deadly seriousness.
‘Comprende…?’

The silence lasted for all of thirty seconds, the sabre fight with their eyes an evenly matched thing. Then Federico Bellini sat back in his thick brown leather chair, huffed out a short laugh, gave a shake of his head and said, ‘Next weekend. Here, I think. We will keep this official, above-board and on the right side of the sheets, if you don’t mind.’

‘Grazie,’
Marco thanked him, and not by a flicker did he wallow in his triumph.

But his father hadn’t finished. His eyes suddenly took on a devilish gleam. ‘Now all you have to do is get your mother to see things your way…’

Carlotta had already been in and returned the bedroom to its usual pristine smoothness, Antonia found. Nothing out of place, nothing to show that the room had been used at all. Walking over to a built-in closet, she took out the small leather suitcase again. She wasn’t really surprised to find that Marco had neatly returned her clothes to their appropriate places in the room. It was the way of the man. The way of his housekeeper. Everything neat and in its place. This bedroom was Antonia’s place. Last night should have reminded her of that.

This time no angry male strode in to halt the process of packing. The suitcase closed with a snap. But as she set the case down on the floor a knock sounded on the door and Carlotta stepped inside.

Of course, she had to see the suitcase. Her eyes shot to Antonia’s. ‘No,
signorina
, you—’

Something stopped her. An awareness of her place in the order of things? Acceptance that, for Antonia at any rate, leaving was perhaps the wise thing for her to do?

Looking away again, she walked forward. ‘Signor Gabrielli asked me to give you this,’ she said, and handed Antonia a cheque, then turned and left again without uttering another word.

It kind of said it all. Without so much as glancing at the cheque to see how much money her father considered his daughter’s silence worth, she ripped it into small pieces and deposited it in the waste-paper basket, then, simply because she needed to do it, she walked over to the terrace window and stepped outside.

Milan shimmered in the blistering heat of yet another hot summer’s day. Way down there below her the traffic made up for its unusual silence of the night before. And one of the first things her eyes fell upon was the imprint of Marco’s body still hugging the cushions on the lounger he must have used. Carlotta had obviously not got around to coming out here yet, because a sandwich and a glass of red wine were standing on a table close by.

When he hadn’t been able to sleep last night, he must have gone to the kitchen to make himself a late night snack and brought it out here to enjoy. But he’d seen her lying asleep on the other lounger. Food and wine had been forgotten in favour of other forces.

Like the recovery of his woman, she mused. The putting her back where she belonged, in his arms, and in his bed.

Her eyes glazed over. She had to turn away to stop the tears from flowing. It was then that she remembered the tear-drop diamond necklace, and set her feet moving further down the terrace to find it still lying exactly
where she had placed it beneath the lounger. Recovering it, she took it back into the bedroom and was about to put it down on her dressing table when she noticed the note from Marco folded there.

‘Don’t worry me,
cara
,’ it said. ‘Be here when I return.’

It came without warning. The first sob, followed quickly by another—and another. Dropping onto the dressing stool, she covered her face with her hands then simply let go and sobbed her heart out.

When it was over, she stood up. Took a moment to compose herself and decide what she needed to do before she left here for the last time…

Marco was standing alone in his father’s library, using the landline telephone to connect him with the Romano Gallery. He wanted Stefan Kranst. He got Rosetta Romano.

‘Where is he?’ he demanded.

‘He flies home to England this afternoon,’ Rosetta told him. ‘I thought you must know that he never meant to stay longer than the first-night viewing. What do you want me to do with Signorina Carson’s painting?’ she asked. ‘Stefan never said, and Signorina Carson rang off before I could ask her when she called looking for Stefan not ten minutes ago.’

The painting. Marco frowned. He’d forgotten all about it. ‘Have it packed up and delivered to my apartment,’ he instructed. ‘Did Antonia say why she wanted Kranst?’

‘No. She just asked where he was staying and rang off, that was all.’

Marco rang off too. It wasn’t that he was worried any longer about Stefan Kranst, he told himself. But his feet
took him in search of his father to wish him a quick farewell before he was heading outside and to the waiting helicopter. It didn’t occur to him, until he was in the air again, that he could have rung Antonia before leaving, just to check that she was okay.

Okay, he then repeated drily. You want to check that she’s actually there! He didn’t trust her. Could he trust her? ‘This changes nothing,’ she had told him in the depths of a night of loving. Impulsively he fished out his mobile. One glance from his pilot and he was reluctantly putting it away again.

Antonia was arguing with Stefan. ‘You have to do this for me, Stefan—please,’ she begged him. ‘You
owe
it to me after last night’s fiasco!’

‘Isabella Bellini was contrite afterwards, if that helps you any,’ he told her.

‘I don’t care what she was!’ It was almost a sob. ‘It doesn’t make any difference. My mind is made up. I’m leaving Milan.’

‘And Marco?’ he included.

She swallowed and nodded. ‘These are the keys.’ Her fingers shook as she held them out to him. ‘All you need to do is pay off the lease then get my things and bring them with you back to London.’

Stefan refused to take the keys. ‘What in heaven’s name happened after you left with him?’ he demanded impatiently.

But she shook her head. ‘I’ll tell you another time. I have a plane to catch.’

‘Does he know you’re going?’ Stefan asked.

She didn’t answer. He released a sigh. ‘My darling, I’ve told you something like this before but I am going
to say it again. Marco Bellini is not a man to cross swords with.’

Her chin shot up, jewel-bright eyes sparkling with something he had never seen there before. It was bitter, blinding, gut-wrenching cynicism. ‘Is that your way of saying that
you
don’t want to cross swords with him?’

‘My God,’ Stefan breathed, and took the keys. ‘Go,’ he said. ‘Go!’ he repeated. ‘I’ll follow on tomorrow if I can get a flight. But go if you must.’

‘Thank you,’ she whispered, kissed his cheek and left his hotel suite without looking back again. If she had done she would have hesitated, because Stefan was wearing a look fit to slay any dragon that might be threatening her.

And she didn’t want Marco slayed. She needed to know he was alive and happy. In fact, it was essential to her own sanity that he remained exactly the way she wanted to remember him. Tall and lean and suave and sophisticated, but wearing one of those lazy grins that oozed sex appeal. She wanted to remember him laughing with his friends. Talking seriously about art. Or lying on a sun lounger in the middle of the night with a glass of red wine and a sandwich—missing her.

Oh, yes, she needed him to miss her, she admitted, as her taxi began a battle with Milan’s mad Saturday traffic.

She had managed to reserve a seat on a flight out of Linate airport, which was only four miles outside Milan. But it was tourist season and the roads to the airport were as busy as she had ever seen them. As the taxi eventually made it to the perimeter of the airport compound she glanced outside in time to catch the sun sparkling on a helicopter as it hovered just before landing.

Marco’s preferred form of transport to his parents’

home, she recalled, with a sad little smile, and turned away quickly, not wanting to think about Marco right now when she could still weaken and change her mind.

Marco saw the traffic as he came in to land, and cursed it. It was going to take an age to get back into the city through all of that. With a quick thanks to his pilot he got out of the helicopter and strode off towards the airport building. Any other time he would be heading for the executive car park and jumping into his car. But the Ferrari had been booked in for a service this morning, so he’d had to come here by taxi. Which meant he now had to walk right across the airport concourse to find the nearest taxi rank.

If he’d thought about it, he could have used the Lotus and saved himself a lot of hassle, because he had things to do, people to see, before he could get back to Antonia.

Which reminded him. Taking out his mobile, he tried getting a signal. It was only when nothing happened that he realised he’d forgotten to put the battery on charge the night before. The damn thing was dead. Sighing, he pocketed the phone again.

It was beginning to turn into one of those days.

The airport lounges were busy, packed to bursting with newly arriving tourists. Taking the direct route towards the exit doors, he had to squeeze between people and their luggage. There was a moment when he paused though, half considering going to check in the other lounge to see if Stefan Kranst was there. But he decided he didn’t have the time and kept on going towards the exit.

Outside again, the queue for taxis was long. Frustration bit into his patience while he waited with
the rest of them. As one cab drove off another took its place. The constant circling of people to and from Milan must be a very good earner, the banker in him decided.

At last he got his turn. Diving into the back of the cab, he gave his destination, then closed the door. As he sat back, he experienced the strangest sensation when he picked up the scent of Antonia’s perfume.

On his clothes, on his skin? he wondered. Or was it so impregnated into his senses that it was always there? He liked that idea. It made him smile and relax while he let the driver take on the battle to get him where he needed to go.

To Buccellati’s first, to find something that bit special for Antonia to wear on her finger. Then the less palatable task of taking on his mother…

By the time Antonia discovered that her flight had been delayed she was beginning to have second thoughts about running away like this. She didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to stay. She didn’t know what she wanted to do!

Yes, you do, she told herself. You want to have everything go back to how it was. But it can’t. Too much has happened.

I love him, though!

She lowered her head, glad she’d left her hair down because it helped to hide the tears swimming in her eyes. Her bag lay across her lap. She opened it up to hunt for a paper tissue. But what she came up with was a photograph taken at Nicola and Franco’s wedding. She was standing next to Marco and he had his arm around her. She looked so happy. So did he, though not in the same way. Her happiness shone through with love, his shone with—

Sexual contentment.

She was right to go, she told herself.

But her mouth began to quiver, and the tears were beginning to spread.

Stefan thought she was making a mistake. He had been angry—disappointed with her, even. ‘He’ll strike back hard,’ he’d warned her before at the de Maggio’s anniversary party.

Oh, yes, please let him do that, she prayed, like the weak little fool that she was. Let him come for me, lock me up and throw away the key—I don’t care! I
like
being his mistress! It’s everyone else the job seems to offend!

Think of your mother, she grimly told herself. Think of Anton Gabrielli and how you could actually
see
Marco becoming like him in years to come! Then, no, she denied. That isn’t true. If I was pregnant Marco wouldn’t—

How do you
know
he wouldn’t?

She didn’t know, and that was the ugly little truth which kept her pinned to the chair in the airport lounge instead of getting up and running back to him. Anton Gabrielli had planted a lot of ugliness into her heart, she realised. The contempt, the accusations, the automatic belief that she must be out for all she could get. He’d despised her mother just for
being
! He despised her in the same way. So did Marco’s mother.

Her chin jerked up. It was a strange sensation, but her heart suddenly felt as if someone had walked past and wiped it clean as a slate!

Only a mother could do that. Only a mother had the power to wipe another woman clean of any aspirations towards her son. So maybe it was because of Isabella Bellini’s contempt that she was still sitting on this chair.

For, without her blessing, any relationship with Marco would be sordid from now on.

It hadn’t felt sordid last night. It had been beautiful last night. It had been special. Marco had made it special. ‘Don’t worry me,’ he’d written. ‘Be here when I return.’

Her heart gave a squeeze. As the muscles relaxed again, all the warmth and feelings of love came flooding back in. Glancing down, she saw the photograph still clutched in her hands. The tears came back. The indecision. She wished they would call her flight. She needed to go—get away from here!

Marco strode into the apartment building and headed directly for the lift. He’d had a good day in a lot of ways. A real
coup d’état!
But it had taken too much time, and now he was anxious to see Antonia, begin to put things on a proper footing for them at last.

As the lift took him up with its usual smoothness he found himself smiling when his hand coiled round the small ring box in his pocket. The lift stopped, the doors slid open. He strode out. This was it, he told himself as he opened the apartment door. The most important few minutes of his life were about to happen!

Strangely, he’d never expected it to feel this good.

Stepping inside, the first thing he saw was the large brown cord-wrapped package leaning against the wall—Antonia’s portrait he’d had delivered from the Romano Gallery. The next thing was Carlotta. She was standing there wringing her hands. Ice cold struck right through to his heart.