Vettori's Damsel in Distress (Harlequin Romance Large Print) (5 page)

For a moment nothing seemed to move and in his head, above the drumming of his heartbeat, he could hear Lisa asking how long it had been since he’d been laid.

Until tonight he hadn’t noticed, hadn’t cared, but then Angelica Amery had walked into his bar and it was as if she’d hit the start button on the part of him that, for self-protection, he’d switched off months ago. The part that could rage, react,
feel.
The moment he’d turned, seen her sparkling with snow, he’d known that all he had to do was put out his hand, touch her, and the life would come flooding back. And, like blood returning to a numb limb, the pain would follow.

He’d spent the last months concentrating on work, using it to create an impermeable membrane between his public life—devoting himself to this community,
his
community—and the vacuum within.

In a vacuum no one could hear you scream...

‘Who’s Sean?’ he asked. She frowned at his abruptness. ‘You said Sean called you a skinny vampire.’

‘Oh, right. He’s my brother-in-law,’ she said. ‘He and Elle have three little girls.’ Her smile was something else, lighting up her face, making him want to smile right back. ‘As for the vampire thing, it’s just a look, Dante. I don’t bite. Well, not often.’ She scooped up another forkful of pasta. ‘Just a little nip here, a little nip there but, unlike the kitten, I make it a rule to never draw blood.’

‘A pity. I suspect that having you kiss it better would be an unforgettable experience.’ Then, before she could speak, ‘I’m sorry, that was—’

‘No. I’m the one who has to apologise.’ The pasta never made it to her mouth. ‘I don’t normally fling myself at total strangers.’ She gave up pretending to eat and put down her fork. ‘What am I saying? I
never
fling myself at total strangers. It must have been the shock—’

‘Don’t!’ Without thinking, he’d reached out and put his hand over hers to stop her and the pulse in the tip of his thumb began to pick up speed, thrum in his ears. His brain did a desperate drive-by of all the meaningless phrases one used to cover awkward moments. None fitted. ‘Don’t apologise.’ He didn’t want her to apologise for kissing him so he said the only thing in his head—the truth. ‘It’s quite the best thing that’s happened to me in a while.’

And that rushing in his ears had to be the sound of life pouring through the gaping hole she’d punched through his impermeable membrane.

Removing his hand, he abandoned his own supper and then, because he had to do something, he got up and opened the doors of the wood burner. ‘What did the bank say?’ he asked as he tossed in a couple of logs.

She didn’t answer and he half turned.

‘They took the details,’ she said quickly. ‘Asked me a load of questions. I got the feeling they thought, or maybe just hoped, that I’d shared my password with a boyfriend who’d done the dirty and cleaned me out.’

‘It happens.’

‘Not to me!’ Perhaps realising that she’d used rather more vehemence than necessary, she said, ‘My grandmother lost everything to a con artist not long after my mother died. He was elegant, charming, endlessly patient with us girls. He even bought me some black hair ribbons. It wasn’t just Grandma. We all fell for him, even the dog. It took us a long time to recover. Financially and emotionally.’

‘Is that why you’re so angry with yourself?’ he asked, standing up. ‘You shouldn’t be. You’re as much a victim as if you’d been mugged in the street.’

‘I know, but damn it, Dante, it was just so
perfect
. The living room had French windows that opened onto a tiny balcony with a distant view of the Duomo and there was a small second bedroom that I was going to use as a workroom...’ She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. I know it doesn’t exist but I’m still having trouble getting my head around this.’

‘You know what’s happened, but it’s taking some parts of your brain a while to catch up.’

He knew how it was. He still had sleepless night reruns of the day he’d laid everything out for Valentina, giving her the choice to stay or walk away. She’d used everything she had—soft words and scorching sex—in a last-ditch effort to persuade him to change his mind. Trying to rewrite the scene, behaved better. She pulled a face. ‘I guess.’

‘A delayed flight, bad weather and then discovering that you’re a victim of fraud would be enough to cloud anyone’s thoughts.’

‘Mine appear to be denser than mud.’

‘Have you any idea what you will do?’ he asked. ‘Stay or go home?’

She lifted her shoulders. ‘If I go home I’ll be in the same situation as if I stay. Nowhere to live, no job, no money until the bank sorts out a refund.
If
the bank sorts out a refund.’

‘What about your sisters?’

‘Oh, they’d give me a room and a job like a shot but then I’ll be stepping back into the role of baby sister. A big black cuckoo in the happy families’ nest.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘It’s late. Is there a B&B close by? A
pensione
? Somewhere that would take me in at this time of night?’

‘Close enough.’ He turned back to the fire and gave it a prod with the poker, sending up a cloud of sparks. ‘Lisa has given you her room. It’s the one opposite the bathroom.’

‘Bathroom?’ She frowned as she tried to make sense of that. ‘Do you mean her room here? In this apartment? But I couldn’t possibly—’

‘There’s a lock on the door,’ he said before she could finish.

‘What? No...’ He couldn’t be sure whether she had blushed or it was the glow from the fire warming her cheeks. ‘I meant I couldn’t possibly impose on you.’

‘I think you should try,’ he said. ‘As you said, it’s late and there’s the additional problem—’

‘I have some cash. And a credit card for use in emergencies. I’d say this counts as an emergency, wouldn’t you?’

‘Undoubtedly, but if you’d let me finish? I was going to say that there’s a problem with the kitten. He’s not going to find much of a welcome in a hotel.’

‘I could—’

‘No,’ he said. ‘You couldn’t.’

‘You don’t know what I was going to say.’

‘You were going to say that you could put him back in your pocket and no one would ever know.’ He raised an eyebrow, daring her to deny it. ‘We all know how that turned out this evening.’

‘Okay, so the kitten is a problem,’ she admitted, ‘but what about Lisa?’

‘What about her?’

‘If I have her room, where will she sleep?’

‘Where she always sleeps,’ he said. ‘She keeps a few things here just in case there’s an unannounced visit from her family, but she actually lives with Giovanni.’

‘Really?’

‘You think she’s a bit old to be worrying what her parents think about her living with her boyfriend?’

‘Well, yes.’

Dante had avoided looking at Angelica when he’d told her about the room. Forget the kitten, there was no way he was letting her leave after fainting so dramatically, but the flash of heat between them had complicated what should have been a simple offer of hospitality. She had to believe that there were no strings attached. No expectation that she follow through on a kiss that had fall-into-bed written all over it from the first touch.

He really had to stop thinking about that kiss.

‘It’s complicated.’

‘I can do complicated,’ she said. ‘I have a very complicated family.’

‘True.’ He wanted to know all about them. All about her. Almost as much as he didn’t... ‘But nowhere near as complicated as a hundred-year-old family feud over a goat.’

‘A goat?’ Angelica looked startled, those hot crimson lips ready to laugh. If she laughed...

‘Have you ever taken home a stray goat, Angelica?’

‘Oh, please. Even I know that a goat in a well-tended garden is a recipe for disaster. They are particularly partial to roses and my grandmother loves her roses.’

‘Goats will eat anything, but it’s a story for late at night after good food and too much wine,’ he said.

‘Mine too,’ Angelica said. ‘Maybe we should save them for another night?’

‘It’s a date...’

No. Not a date...

Madonna
, this was difficult.

One minute they’d been on the point of ripping one another’s clothes off and maybe, just maybe, if he hadn’t had time to think, it would have been all right. Now—thanks to an internet con and a stray kitten —Angelica might as well have a ‘Do Not Touch’ sign around her neck.

‘You must be tired. I’ll show you the room.’

‘Yes... No...’ The lace at her throat moved as she swallowed, the light catching the facets of the jet brooch. ‘You and Lisa have both been incredibly kind but you don’t know anything about me.’ Then, and rather more to the point if she was going to be his roommate for the night, ‘I don’t know anything about you.’

CHAPTER FIVE

‘Eat spinach tomorrow; today is for ice cream.’

—
from
Rosie’s Little Book of Ice Cream

‘T
HAT
’
S
NOT
TRUE
,’
Dante said quickly. Too quickly. ‘At least not the first part. I’ve learned a lot about you.’ He shut the doors of the wood burner, carefully replaced the poker on its stand and propped his elbow on the mantelpiece, hoping that he looked a lot more relaxed about this than he felt. ‘You’re a talented designer. You have a wide knowledge of first aid. And ice cream. And you have a complicated family who you care deeply about.’ It was there in her voice every time she mentioned them.

‘That’s not much to go on when you’re opening your home to a total stranger.’

‘Maybe not, but you’re compassionate.’ She had also turned every head when she’d walked into his bar—always a bonus—and was the first woman to make him feel like a man in over a year. He should focus on the compassion. ‘Despite the fact that you were lost and it was beginning to snow, you still chose to rescue a helpless kitten. I am simply doing—’

‘I am not helpless!’ Geli said, shifting from calm to heat in a heartbeat, which brought a touch of colour to highlight those fine cheekbones.

‘—doing my best to aid a damsel in distress,’ he continued, rapidly editing out any reference to helpless or maiden. She was not helpless and no maiden kissed the way she had kissed him.

His reward was a snort of laughter, quickly suppressed. Whether it was at the thought of herself as a damsel or him as a knight errant, he had no way of knowing, but he was glad to have made her laugh, if only briefly.

‘Sorry, Dante, but I don’t believe in fairy tales.’

‘No? All those orphans? All that abuse, abandonment, fear? What’s not to believe?’ he asked. ‘You’ve just had a very close encounter with the hot breath of the wolf in disguise.’

‘Nothing as beautiful as a wolf. Just the cold, unfeeling click of a mouse.’ She straightened her back, sat a little taller. ‘Okay, I’ve lost money that I worked hard for, but I’m not going to starve and I’m not going to be sleeping in a shop doorway.’

‘Not tonight. And not while there’s a room here.’

‘I—’

‘Tomorrow I’ll take you to the
commissariato
so that you can report the fraud,’ he said, hoping to distract her. ‘You’ll need some help with the language.’

‘Is there any point? Catching Internet crooks is like trying to catch flies with chopsticks.’

‘Made all the harder by the fact that those who’ve been caught often feel too foolish to report the crime. As if they are in some way to blame for their own misfortune. They’re not. You’re not,’ he said, taking the half-eaten pasta from her.

The colour in her cheeks darkened. ‘I know, but I was careless, forgot the basic rule and let my guard down. It will be tougher now to do what I planned, but I am not going to allow a low-life scumbag to steal my dreams and creep home with my tail between my legs.’ She took a breath. ‘I will not be a victim.’

Her words were heartfelt, passionate, and everything Italian in him wanted to cry out
Bravissima
, kiss her cheeks, wrap her in a warm embrace. His English genes knew better. She wasn’t just angry with the criminals; she was angry with herself for falling for the con.

‘Basic rule?’ he asked.

‘Always be suspicious of perfection. If it looks too good to be true, then it almost certainly is.’

‘We fall for that one all the time, Angelica. The entire advertising industry is built on that premise. You were meant to fall in love with the apartment and it won’t just have been you.’

She sighed. ‘No. And it won’t just be that apartment, will it? There’ll be a host of perfect apartments and villas lined up for the unwary.’

‘Undoubtedly. It’s your public duty to warn the police that they are likely to be inundated with angry tourists who’ve paid good money for non-existent accommodation this summer. And maybe stop more people being caught.’

‘I suppose...’ She tilted her head a little. ‘I read somewhere that in Milan the policewomen wear high heels. Is that true?’

‘There’s only one way to find out,’ he said. ‘Is it a date?’

‘Another one? At this rate we’ll be going steady...’ Their eyes met and for a moment the air sizzled between them and he was the one swallowing hard. ‘It’s a date,’ she said quickly.

‘Can I offer you something else?’ he asked. ‘Tea, coffee, or do you want to go downstairs and raid the fridge for dessert?’

‘Tea?’ she repeated, grabbing onto something sane, something sensible. ‘Proper tea?’

‘Proper tea,’ he confirmed.

‘Well, now you’re talking,’ she said, uncurling herself from the corner of the sofa.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked as she gathered the dishes.

‘Whoever cooks in our house is let off the washing-up,’ she said, heading for the kitchen before he could tell her to sit down.

‘It’s a good system,’ he said, ‘but I do have a dishwasher.’

‘You do?’

She looked around and her scepticism was understandable. Apart from the American retro-style fridge he’d installed when he moved in, the kitchen was pretty much as Nonnina had left it. A dresser, loaded with old plates, took up most of one wall, while a family-sized table dominated the centre and a couple of old armchairs stood by the wood stove in the corner—much used in the days when they could only afford to heat one room in winter and the main room was kept for best. It was comfortable, familiar and he liked it the way it was. Which didn’t mean he was averse to modern domestic convenience.

‘The twenty-first century is through here,’ he said, opening the door into what had once been a large pantry but was now a fully fitted utility room.
‘Il bagno di servizio.’

‘Magic! You have the best of both worlds.’

‘I’m glad you approve.’

Valentina hadn’t been impressed, but then his father had given her a personal tour of his apartment in the Quadrilatero d’Oro. He put the kettle on for tea while Angelica stacked the dishes in the machine. The light gleamed on glossy black hair that swung silkily about her shoulders as she moved. On the soft curve of her crimson lips as she turned and saw him watching her.

‘It’s snowing heavily now,’ she said, looking out of the window. ‘Will it last?’

‘It could be gone by morning, or it could be set in for days,’ he said, but he wasn’t looking at the snow piling up in the corners of the window. He was looking at her reflection. ‘Whichever it is, there’s nothing we can do about it.’

‘Except enjoy it. If my mother were alive she’d go out and make a snowman.’

‘Now?’

‘Absolutely. It might turn to rain in the night and the moment would be lost.’ The thought brought a smile to her lips. ‘She got us all up in the middle of night once, when it had begun to snow. We made snowmen, had a snowball fight and afterwards she heated up tins of tomato soup to warm us up.’

‘And was it all gone in the morning?’

‘No, but we had a head start on all the other kids.’ Her eyes were shining at the memory as she turned to him. ‘She never let the chance for fun pass. Maybe she sensed that time was short and she had to make memories for us while she could.’

‘Is that what you’re doing? Following her example,’ he added when she frowned.

‘Always say goodbye as if it’s for the last time. Live each day as if it’s our last...’

‘Are you saying that you want to go out and have a snowball fight?’ he asked, not wanting to remember how he’d parted from his father.

‘Would you come?’ she asked but, before he could answer, she shook her head. ‘Just kidding. It’s been a long day.’

‘And you’ve had a bad introduction to life in Isola,’ he said, although, on reflection, it wasn’t an evening which, given the option, he would have missed. ‘On the other hand, a little excitement to raise the heartbeat is never a bad thing and you did say that you came to Italy for experience?’

As their eyes met in the reflection in the window he wanted to rewind the clock, stop it at the moment her tongue had touched his lip... Then, as if it was too intimate, intense, she turned to look directly at him.

‘Believe me,’ she said, catching a yawn, ‘it has delivered and then some.’

‘You’re tired.’ She had neither accepted nor refused Lisa’s room but, whatever doubts she might have had about staying, whatever doubts he might have about the wisdom of offering it to her, the weather had made the decision for them both. ‘Lisa brought up your case,’ he said, picking up the mug of tea he’d made her and leading the way to the room his cousin had dressed to make it look, to the casual glance, as if she was using it.

There was a basket of cosmetics on the dressing table, a book beside the bed. A pair of shoes beneath it, lying as if they’d just been kicked off.

‘How long has she been living with Giovanni?’

‘She followed him here from Melbourne just over a year ago,’ he said, picking up Lisa’s shoes and tossing them into the wardrobe. ‘To be honest, I didn’t think their relationship would survive the day-to-day irritations of living together.’ Not that he’d cared one way or the other at the time.

‘Is that the voice of experience?’ she asked.

‘I came close once.’ He looked at her and she shook her head.

‘Not even close,’ she said.

‘The village gossips?’

‘They wouldn’t have stopped me.’

‘No...’ He crossed to the shutters, stood for a moment looking down at the piazza. The snow was blanketing the city in silence, softening the edges, making everything look clean.

Angelica pressed her hands against the window and sighed. ‘I love snow.’ Her voice was as soft as one of the huge snowflakes sticking to the window and, unable to help himself, he turned and looked at her. ‘It’s like being in another world,’ she said, ‘in a place where time doesn’t count.’ And then she turned from the window and looked up at him.

Geli could feel Dante’s warmth as they stood, not quite touching, in front of the cold window. Everything about the moment was heightened, her senses animal sharp; she could almost hear the thud of his pulse beating a counterpoint to her own, almost taste the pheromones clouding the air. She wanted to tug his shirt from his waistband and rub her cheek against his chest, scent marking him, catlike, as hers.

Lifting his hand in what felt like slow motion, Dante leaned in to her. Her skin tingled, anticipating his touch. Her lips throbbed, hot, feeling twice their normal size. The down on her cheek stirred, lifting to the heat of his hand, and she closed her eyes but his touch never came. Instead, there was the click as he reached over her head to pull shut one of the shutters and every cell in her body screamed
Noooo!

‘My room has an en suite, so the bathroom is all yours,’ he said abruptly. ‘There’s plenty of hot water and no one will disturb you if want to soak off the day.’

No one would disturb her? Was he crazy? She was disturbed beyond reason.

She had nowhere to live, she’d lost her money but all she’d been thinking about was kissing Dante Vettori, ripping open the buttons of his shirt and exploring his warm skin. Imagining how his long fingers would feel curved around her breast—

Click
went the second shutter and, released from the mesmerising drift of the snow, she was jolted back to reality and somehow managed a hoarse, ‘Thank you.’

He nodded. ‘If you need me for anything I’ll be downstairs in the office, catching up with the paperwork.’

‘I’ve been keeping you from your work?’

‘I’d stopped to eat. That’s why I was in the bar when you arrived. You know where everything is. Please...make yourself at home.’

‘Dante...’ He waited, hand on the door. ‘Thank you.’

He responded with the briefest of nods. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

Geli didn’t move until she heard the door to the flat close and then her shoulders slumped. How on earth had they come from the promise of a searing kiss to such awkwardness in the space of an hour, two at the most?

Halfway between the two, she discovered when she checked her watch, and that was the answer. Too much had happened too quickly.

If the kitten hadn’t made such a dramatic appearance they would have been able to sit quietly over supper. Dante would have explained about the flat, helped her find a room for the night and then tomorrow she’d have come by to thank him and maybe, hopefully, pick up on the fizz of attraction that had sizzled between them.

Instead, they’d veered between meltdown lust and awkwardness and in an effort to cover that she’d revealed way too much about herself.

Her mother, black hats—where on earth had all that come from? And that pheasant... She hadn’t talked about that since her sisters had arrived home on the school bus to find her and Grandma singing a heartfelt
All Things Bright and Beautiful
over its resting place beneath a climbing rose.

* * *

‘Dio...’
Dante, the image of Angelica with her hands pressed against the window burning a hole in his brain, pulled open the bottom drawer of his desk and took out a bottle of grappa.

He poured himself a shot, tossed it back and for a moment he let the heat of it seep through his veins.

Close. He’d been within a whisper of touching her, had almost felt the down on her cheek rising to meet him as, lips softened, eyes closed, she’d anticipated a rerun of that kiss. He clenched his hand in an attempt to eradicate the memory.

He might have stepped back, walked out of the apartment before he did something unforgivable, but it hadn’t stopped his imagination reacting to what had been a non-stop blast to his senses ever since she’d walked into his bar and stopped the conversation dead. The steely fresh air smell of her hair, snowflakes melting on her cheek, on crimson lips, she’d looked like something from a fairy tale. A lost princess stumbling out of the darkness.

He’d turned, their eyes had met and in that first look he’d forgotten the pain. The heartache...

And then she’d said, ‘Via Pepone.’

He should have let Lisa deal with her because by then the complications were piling up, but that first look had fired a lightning charge through his senses, jump-starting them from hibernation as she walked towards him. As he’d touched her hand. As she’d removed her glove, removed her coat in a slow, tantalising reveal of the briefest little black dress.