Читать книгу The Proud Wife - Kate Walker - Страница 7

PIETRO stood by the windows of his lawyer’s office and stared out at the driving rain that was lashing against the glass. His shoulders were hunched, hands pushed deep into the trouser pockets of a sleek silk suit that was the same steely grey as the water-laden clouds above. Impatience made him tap one highly polished black leather shoe against the floor, over and over again.

She was late. They had been waiting far too long. The meeting had been arranged for ten-thirty and it was now almost a quarter to eleven. She was almost fifteen minutes late—if she was even coming, that was.

Expressing his exasperation in a sigh, he raked one hand through the smooth darkness of his hair, narrowing his eyes against the downpour beyond the window. She was in Sicily, at least. Frederico, his driver, had delivered her to the hotel yesterday after picking her up from the airport. He had given her the package of documents that Matteo Rinaldi, his legal advisor, had drawn up for this meeting so that she could have her lawyer go through them and be prepared.

He had told her the precise time of the meeting, so there was no excuse for her lateness. Where the …?

His thoughts came to an abrupt halt in the same moment that down below in the street a taxi pulled up opposite the lawyer’s office, stopping in a splash of puddles and a spray of rain. The woman in the back was just a blur through the rain-dashed windows, only the glorious burn of her auburn hair giving any sign that it was indeed his ex-wife.

But that glow of red, hazy though it was, was enough to give him a sharp kick in his guts with the reminder of how it had once looked spread out on his pillows as she lay beneath him, her soft body melded to his. Heat flooded his veins and had him gritting his teeth against the impact of the memory.

‘She’s here at last,’ he said to Matteo, meaning to turn away from the window and step back into the room. But as he spoke the back door of the taxi opened and the woman stepped out on to the pavement.

‘She’s here,’ he said again on a very different note. As he spoke, the woman—Marina—suddenly looked up as if she had caught the words from across the street, staring straight at him; their focused gazes locked and held.

Even from this distance he could see how her vivid green gaze widened and fixed on him. There was no mistaking the way her back stiffened, her head coming up, her chin lifting. There was defiance in every voluptuous inch of her and she held a document case against her body like some powerful shield used to deflect the power of any opposing force.

It was the first time in two years that he had seen her and it hit him with a sense of shock that she was so much the same, totally unchanged—yet somehow totally different, alien and distant from him. And not just because of the barrier of the glass between them.

Another second passed, two, the space of a single heavy heartbeat; their eyes held. It seemed that his breath had died, freezing in his lungs so that he was completely still, not even blinking once. But then another car roared past, spraying puddles everywhere. Marina stepped back hastily and the spell was broken.

A moment later she was hurrying across the road, head down, long legs covering the space quickly, feet in neat black-patent shoes dancing between the puddles. He expected that she would put up the document case to protect her hair but instead she still held it close to her side. But then Marina had always loved the rain.

A sudden vivid image flashed into his head—that of Marina dancing in the rain, her wild hair hanging loose over her shoulders, spinning round her face as she turned. She had been so alive, so full of fun. So beautiful. She had laughed in his face when he had told her to come indoors because she was getting a soaking.

‘It’s warm rain compared to the stuff in England,’ she had declared. ‘And I’m not going to melt because of a few drops of water!’

When he had ventured out into the downpour to bring her back inside, she had caught hold of his hands and held him there, forcing him to dance with her too until they had both been soaked to the skin. Only then had she let him sweep her off her feet and up into his arms. He had carried her into the palazzo and up to their bedroom, where he had taken his revenge for his drenching in the most satisfying and sensual way possible.

‘Dannazione!’ Pietro muttered under his breath, cursing himself and his memories as he took a grip on his thoughts and got them back under his control. With a rough movement, he turned away from the window, focusing his attention back into the room and onto the battle that was to come.

Now was not the time for sentimental memories, for recalling flashes of time when he had deluded himself that he was happy. When he had thought that the white-hot burn of passion he felt for Marina was actually love and not something far more basic, far more unmanageable.

Passion had tumbled him into bed with Marina without thought, and the result of that passion had pushed him into a premature proposal of marriage in order to keep her there. To have and to hold. He hadn’t been able to bear the thought of her being with any other man, and had seen her unexpected pregnancy as an excuse for putting a ring on her finger to ensure she stayed with him.

Then he hadn’t been able to anticipate that there might be a day when he would decide that it was time to let her go. That he would see they no longer had a future together and that the fragile foundations on which their marriage had been built had crumbled to pieces under their feet. He would have laughed in the face of anyone who had told him that such a day would come. Yet now here he was, just waiting for her to sign the papers so that they could draw a line under the mess they had made of things.

The sound of the lift coming to a halt, its metal doors sliding open, alerted him to the fact that she was here. Any moment now his estranged wife was going to walk through that door and …

‘Marina …!’

With a struggle he caught back the exclamation, the way that her name almost escaped him. Even though he’d prepared himself for it, the moment she actually appeared in the room still managed to take his breath away. It was as if some force of nature, a blaze of sunlight or a wild whirling wind, had come in through the doorway, freshening and changing the atmosphere in the office.

She looked sensational. The metallic-toned trenchcoat she wore was belted tightly at her waist, emphasising the slenderness there in contrast to the curves of her hips, the full breasts that pushed against the dampened fabric. Whatever she had on underneath had some sort of V-neck so that nothing hid the fine lines of her throat, the shadowy valley that drew his gaze inexorably downwards until he wrenched it away with a cruel effort. Her glorious hair was darkened by the rain; strands of it tugged free from the confining ponytail in which she wore it. And the weather—or perhaps the dash across the road—had whipped up the colour in her normally delicate, porcelain skin so that her cheeks glowed with colour. Above the slanting cheekbones, her green eyes were strangely dark, the colour of moss rather than the vivid emerald he remembered.

The look she turned on him was blank and distant, totally closed off, as if she had never seen him in her life before. He knew that look; it was the one she had used so often in the last days of their marriage before she had walked out. When he had seen her, that is. Which hadn’t been often.

‘Signora D’Inzeo …’

Matteo, ever the smooth professional, was moving forward, hand outstretched to greet her.

‘Good morning.’

Her smile was brief, controlled, flashing on and off in a second. But it was more than she afforded her husband. The swift there-and-away-again flick of her eyes, the barest lifting of those long, lush eyelashes, granted him minimal acknowledgement as she curled her mouth around his name.

‘Pietro.’

It was as if the word had a sour, unpleasant taste on her tongue.

‘Marina.’

His own greeting echoed hers, with added ice, if that were possible. He inclined his head the slightest amount possible, then clamped ruthless control over every facial muscle, until even he felt the invisible barriers they had erected between them, the force field of distance and distrust which separated them.

‘May I take your coat?’

Matteo was really trying to improve the atmosphere, or at least warm it up by a few vital degrees. But then he was a specialised divorce lawyer who handled cases like this all the time; he must be used to the mood of barely sheathed tension between his conflicted clients.

‘Thank you.’

Did she know just how sensual that movement was? Pietro wondered—the tiny shrug that eased the garment from her, thrusting the rich softness of her breasts forward as she put her shoulders back to loosen the fit around them. She probably did, damn her, he admitted, his teeth clenching together in an unconscious response that tightened the muscles in his jaw against the need to make any response. So many times in the past he had performed just that small service for her, had felt the soft skin of her neck and shoulders under the back of his fingers, the silky slide of her hair over his hands as he’d freed her from the garment …

She would turn to smile at him, rub her cheek against his hands, perhaps twist her head to press a kiss on his fingers …

Hell and damnation, no!

Fiercely Pietro dragged his primitive thoughts under control and made himself take a step forward, if only to break the spell that Marina seemed to have cast over him from the moment she’d walked into the room.

‘Can I get you something to drink?’ Matteo was saying. ‘A coffee, perhaps?’

‘Some water will be fine, thanks.’

The removal of the coat revealed a crisp, white V-necked blouse and narrow black skirt: very understated, very controlled, very businesslike.

Very unlike Marina.

Obviously she had chosen the clothes deliberately to convey just the right sort of image. And what image was that? That she was cool and organised and totally in control? In that case, even less like Marina.

The understated look suited her, though. It was undeniably sexy in a very different way. The white top provided a sharp contrast with the rich tones of her hair and the mossy-green glow of her eyes. The slim-fitting skirt flattered her curvy hips and thighs, its shorter length revealing the long lines of her slim legs.

Those hips—and the rest of her body—had more of a curve to them than he remembered from the last time he had seen her, Pietro realised with a sense of shock. In contrast to the glowing woman she was now, then she had looked pale and thin—too thin. Life apart from him obviously suited her, he acknowledged. The thought stabbed him.

The only things about her that were the Marina he remembered were the long, sparkling earrings that dangled close to her neck, gold and multicoloured crystals of different sizes and shapes. They were clearly costume jewellery and a long way from the emerald and diamond creations he had once given her.

‘Shall we all sit down?’ Pietro asked as his lawyer opened and poured sparkling water into a glass. It was time he took charge.

Once more those green eyes flicked in his direction and, although he had his hand on the back of a chair ready to pull it out, Marina deliberately chose one on the opposite side of the big mahogany table, sinking into it in a graceful movement. She placed the document case on the polished surface in front of her, lining it up carefully and folding her hands on top of the brown leather. Seen like this, she had an almost nun-like composure and restraint. Again, so totally unlike the real Marina that it almost made him laugh. He caught back his amusement with effort. Marina, restrained and composed? The words just didn’t go together at all.

He found he rather liked this new image she had assumed. It made him think of the contrast between the outward impression she gave and the person he knew was hidden beneath the conformist clothing. Made him imagine the challenge of getting her out of the subdued garments and freeing the real woman inside. That thought blazed an image into his mind that had him suddenly pulling out his own chair and dropping into it swiftly, so that the barrier of the polished table-top hid the betraying force of his heated response.

As he took his own seat on the other side of the table, Marina accepted the glass that Matteo passed to her and sipped from it carefully. She was still wearing her wedding ring, Pietro noticed, seeing the glint of gold on the fingers wrapped around the glass. It was the last thing he had expected, and he was surprised by the force of his reaction to seeing his ring. It was the ring he had put on her finger after making their wedding vows, still there on the hand of the woman who hadn’t even pretended to play the role of his wife for over two years.

‘Pietro …’

The sound of his name on his estranged wife’s lips jolted him back to the present. He had heard her use his name so many times, but this was like no other time before. This time the single word was both a question and a reproach for the fact that she had said something and, lost in a dangerous blend of angry and erotic thoughts, he had not heard her.

‘Cara?’ he responded, deliberately lacing the endearment with cynicism and knowing he had hit home when he saw her reaction.

Her spine stiffened, her jaw tightened and the soft rosetinted mouth clamped into a thin, rigid line. Green eyes flashed an uncontrolled response. Now she was letting the real Marina show, he thought with a sense of grim satisfaction. Just for a moment the controlled mask had slipped and she had let him have a glimpse of the woman underneath. This was the Marina he knew of old.

‘What exactly are you doing here?’ she asked now, her tone making it clear that she wished he was a million miles away.

He dealt her a smile across the table and felt a flare of dark satisfaction when he saw her eyes widen even more.

‘We arranged to meet to discuss the terms of the divorce,’ he reminded her, calm and reasonable.

Marina took another sip of water and put down her glass with the sort of careful precision that he knew only came when she was really trying to keep a grip on her volatile nature. She wasn’t as much in control as she wanted to appear. That made him want to watch her more closely, to see what he could read in her face, in her eyes.

‘No, you summoned—ordered—me to Sicily so that I could meet with your lawyer to discuss the terms of the divorce. I did not agree to speak to you.’

Oh, he recognised this mood. It was the one where she took everything he said, chewed it up and flung it back at him turned inside out so that it meant the opposite of what he had actually said. It was a mood he knew well. Strangely, it was also a mood that he had missed when she had left him—and before she had left him, his memory warned him, giving a nasty, uncomfortable little poke. Just how long was it since he had seen this Marina in his life at all?

‘We arranged that our lawyers would discuss the terms, yes,’ he pointed out smoothly. ‘We will leave everything to them, if that is how your prefer it. But for that we need your legal representative to be here. Where is your solicitor? He is coming later? Soon?’

‘He’s not coming at all.’

The spark in her eyes, the touch of colour in those alabaster cheeks, the way her head was tilted slightly to one side, her neat chin lifted defiantly, told him he could make what he liked of that.

‘For your information, Pietro, not everyone has a lawyer at their beck and call—a man so ridiculously overpaid that he is obliged to jump and come running whenever you snap your fingers.’

From under her lashes those green eyes went towards Matteo just once, briefly, and then came back to fix on his face again. She didn’t need to use words to tell him exactly what she thought.

‘You gave me precisely one hour to pack and come to Sicily. I had no choice. But I can just imagine what my lawyer would have said if I had even tried to suggest that he do the same.’

Let him make what he wanted of that, Marina told herself. He didn’t like it, that much was plain from the way his whole body stilled and tightened in his seat, his head coming up so that his blue eyes blazed into hers. They were like shards of ice, so cold and clear. And she almost felt that the laser-like burn from them might actually mark her cheek where it rested.

When he sat opposite her like this with his back to the windows, he was little more than a dark silhouette, black against the gloomy sky outside. The surprisingly pale eyes in his carved face were all she could really make out—not that it mattered. The truth was that every stunning feature, from the broad, high forehead down to the surprisingly full and sensual mouth, was seared into her memory, impossible to erase. And, if she let them, those memories would destroy her hard-won composure, take her back to the time when she had worshipped the ground this man walked on. To the time that had almost totally broken her.

Just in the moment that she had looked up across the narrow road, and had seen him standing at the rain-dashed window, it had been like the first time she had met him. Then she had seen him through rain-spattered glass too, through the windscreen of her elderly Mini in the middle of an ice storm in a London street. She had been so stunned by the shocking sensuality of the tall, dark stranger’s beauty that she had lost control of the wheel just for a second—and had been horrified by the appalling crunch and screeching sound as her car had scraped against the side of his luxurious vehicle.

The world had seemed to spin round her, her breath stilling in her lungs, and she had hardly been able to remember who she was or think to give him her insurance details. In the end she hadn’t needed them because he had assured her that the damage was slight and that he would cover the cost of repairs to both cars if she would promise to have dinner with him that night.

She had been totally off-balance where this man was concerned ever since. Just being with him was like being in the eye of some wild, tropical storm every day. She had been swept off her feet, out of reality and into a world of such total delight, wealth and glamour that it had seemed impossible such a fantasy could actually exist.

She had been right about that, of course. She’d had a few short months of perfect delight, total joy—but in the end the fantasy had crashed in flames, burning up all her dreams and illusions as it flared out of control. The passion they had once shared had turned in on itself and destroyed them. Or, rather, it had destroyed Marina, driving her away in misery and pain while Pietro had simply picked up his life and gone on with it as before. He hadn’t even troubled to contact her, never mind come after her when she had fled the marriage that had turned into a nightmare. He had sent that one cold command that she return, and when she had refused he had turned his back on her as if she had never existed.

Until now. Until that cold, brutal summons to come to Sicily to discuss the ending of the marriage that had never really been.

When she had walked into the room and seen him standing to one side of the room, dark and inscrutable, watching every move she made, it was as if the past years had evaporated in a second. Every memory, every sensation she had ever experienced, had returned in the space of a heartbeat. All the defences, the armour she had built around herself in order to be able to get on with her life, had disintegrated, crumbling at her feet, leaving her shaken and defenceless when she most needed to be strong.

She had told herself that she would be completely in control for this meeting. That she would be cool, calm and collected when she and Pietro came face to face again. She had done all her crying for the loss of her marriage, the destruction of her illusions in the past, and now she was going to put them all behind her. She had thought that she was prepared because, no matter what she had just said, she had known full well that she would have to come face to face with her estranged husband at some point during her return to Sicily. Pietro wouldn’t have ordered her back to the island if he hadn’t intended that to happen. He would have to oversee her final dismissal from his life in person, if only to make sure that he was rid of her once and for all. There would have been no point in the summons otherwise. So she had slapped her emotional armour into place, knowing that it made her look hard and distant as a result.

Deep inside, hard and distant was the very last thing she was feeling.

‘You don’t have a lawyer? You didn’t think that you would need someone to protect your interests?’

‘And will I?’

Marina made her words a deliberate challenge. She knew her own private reasons why she hadn’t felt the need to bring along any legal support, but suddenly she wasn’t prepared to reveal those right away.

‘You are my wife.’ Pietro’s shadowed eyes met hers head-on, no trace of doubt or hesitation in his confident stare, though the heavy lids did droop down, hiding their expression behind the long, thick lashes.

‘Soon to be ex,’ Marina reminded him, not allowing herself to be intimidated by his merciless scrutiny.

Oh, he hadn’t liked that; it was obvious from the sudden flare of something dangerous in the depths of his eyes. But he was no longer dealing with the amazed and overwhelmed girl he had married, the one who had been too naive to see him for what he really was. She’d done a lot of growing up in the past couple of years.

‘You are my wife,’ he repeated. ‘And as such you will be given what is due to you.’

Well, that was a double-edged comment, if ever there was one. But which way was she supposed to take it? Marina wondered. As a promise of fair play or a threat of retribution?

‘But first there are a couple of conditions.’

‘Of course.’

She should have expected that. She had expected it. From the moment the letter had arrived summoning her here to this office—Pietro’s lawyer’s office, on this island, Pietro’s home territory—she had known that he intended to show that he had the upper hand. And that he very definitely intended to use it. The sting she felt at the thought of that cold-blooded, ruthless determination turned on her made her flinch inwardly, cursing herself for still being weak enough to let him get under her guard at all. She knew what Pietro was like, didn’t she? She should do. She’d spent almost six months as his wife, had seen every side to his character. She knew how cold, hard, how totally pitiless he could be when he was crossed. The lines etched into his face, the burn of ice in those strangely pale eyes, told her that nothing had softened him in the time they had been apart. And the clipped, controlled tone of his voice warned her that he intended to make no compromises, would give no quarter.

‘Of course?’ Pietro questioned sharply.

‘I expected conditions, yes,’ Marina returned. ‘I’d be a fool not to. You aren’t going to just roll over and give in, are you? That’s hardly your way. Hardly the behaviour of Il Principe Pietro D’Inzeo.’

‘And yet you still came here without a lawyer?’

Just the tone of voice in which the question was asked made her stomach lurch uncomfortably, nerves tying themselves into knots deep inside. It didn’t matter that she told herself there was nothing he could do to harm her; somehow there was a tiny little seed of doubt that left her unable to convince her uncomfortable, jittery mind that it was actually true. She might have a secret card up her sleeve, but suddenly she was plagued by a nervous sense of apprehension at the thought of actually playing it.

Pietro D’Inzeo was a powerful man: a Sicilian prince. Head of the D’Inzeo Bank and all the other companies he’d bought since taking charge of the D’Inzeo business empire. A man with huge riches and influence. She knew from having seen him in action that he never suffered fools gladly, that he was a cold-blooded predator in the business world and that, when crossed, he made a very dangerous enemy. And she was planning to thwart whatever plans he had made for the way this meeting was to go. She was—hopefully—going to checkmate him here in front of his lawyer. A proud Sicilian like Pietro wouldn’t take that lying down.

But, even as the question slid into her thoughts, she instinctively pushed it right out again. If there was one thing she was sure of, it was that Pietro’s sense of honour, his proud Sicilian character, would always ensure he played fair. It had never been the thought of the financial implications of this meeting that had worried her.

The emotional repercussions were a very different matter.

‘I didn’t think I’d need one. After all, there are laws about this sort of thing.’

Seeing the way Pietro’s dark brows snapped together on hearing that, her nerves twisted once more deep in the pit of her stomach. For one desperate moment her heart ached with the memory of the way that hard, carved face used to change when he’d been with her. How those icy eyes had softened, the beautiful mouth curved into a smile. How she had once been able to kiss away that frown between his brows.

‘And besides,’ she added hastily, ‘you said I’d get what was due to me.’

‘I did say that,’ Pietro acceded, his tone not helping things very much.

‘So perhaps you should let me know about these conditions.’

‘Of course.’

It was Matteo, Pietro’s lawyer, who spoke. After a swift glance at his employer’s stony face, earning himself a brief nod of agreement, he now came to sit down opposite Marina, opening a file of papers he had placed on the table between them.

‘It is time we got down to business.’

Marina tried to turn her attention to the lawyer and what he was saying, but it was difficult when the stinging awareness of Pietro and everything he did, every movement he made, was rushing through her like a charge of burning electricity. She was conscious of the way he seemed to have backed down, conceding the central role to his lawyer, but she knew that any such concession was deceptive, totally misleading. He poured himself a drink of water and curled long, tanned fingers around the glass but never lifted it to his lips. He even leaned back in his chair, apparently at his ease—but out of the corner of her eye she could sense the tension that held his long body stiff, watchful and alert.

He was observing everything that was happening, watching her so closely that she almost felt her skin singe under the heat of his gaze. She knew that, although Matteo was speaking, it was Pietro who was in control, his lawyer only the mouthpiece for what he wanted to say.

‘The conditions …?’ she prompted hoarsely, wincing at the way her voice cracked on the words. Struggling for control, she focused every last bit of her attention on the older man opposite her, trying to blot out the fact that Pietro was even there.

‘I don’t think that you will find them too difficult,’ Matteo assured her, tapping the sheaf of documents with an elegant silver pen. It was the same file that had been delivered to her on the plane, the one she hadn’t even opened, never mind read. Because the one thing she had ever wanted from this man was his love and, when she’d realised he had none to give her, there was nothing else that could fill its place.

‘Firstly,’ Matteo said, drawing her attention away from that thought, ‘you must agree to give up the name D’Inzeo and revert to your maiden name.’

‘Willingly.’

The condition had been one she was expecting so she felt a rush of relief that this was all it was.

She meant it, she tried to tell herself. She really did. Bitter memories of the past put a depth of feeling into her response that must surely convince Pietro, even if she couldn’t convince herself. Once she had been so very happy to have Pietro’s name as her own. It was a name with a long-lived Sicilian history, the name of centuries of princes and princesses, hugely wealthy bankers who had a much more prestigious place in the world than her own ordinary middle-class family. She had been proud to have it as her surname, amazed at the deference and response that it brought with it, the speedy effect just mentioning it would create—an effect that Pietro treated with casual disdain.

But most important to her had been that it was the name of the man she adored. And it should have been the name of her baby too. The cruel slash of pain that thought brought with it pushed her into unguarded speech.

‘Why would I want to keep the name of the man whose marriage to me meant nothing to him?’

To his lawyer’s right, she heard Pietro snatch in a sharp, angry-sounding breath from between clenched teeth. Her throat tightened, knotting itself against the lurching beat of her heart as she tensed, waiting for his furious response. But it never came. The look that Matteo flashed towards Pietro silenced whatever outburst had been about to escape his ruthless control and he subsided into silence again, merely indicating with a swift, impatient flick of his free hand that the lawyer should continue.

But Marina couldn’t be unaware of the way that the other hand, the one still wrapped around his water glass, tightened against the hard surface until his knuckles showed white, revealing the fierce struggle he was having with himself to hold back the angry words that had almost escaped him.

‘I will have no trouble with that particular condition,’ she managed stiffly, still keeping her eyes on Matteo’s calm, controlled face.

‘Buon.’

The silver pen made a small check-mark against the relevant paragraph in the document.

‘Next, you will sign a confidentiality agreement, promising never to speak of your marriage, never to reveal anything of your life with Principe D’Inzeo, either during the time you were together or of the reasons why you split up.’

‘I … What?’

Now she had to turn to Pietro; she couldn’t stop herself. She knew that her eyes were wide with anger and disbelief—and, yes, a savage degree of pain—when she turned them on the man who sat silent and immobile as a rock.

‘You want me to sign …?’ she managed, but then the hurt got the better of her.

How could he think that she would ever want the world to know the truth about their life together? That would mean letting everyone know about the way she had been so bitterly disillusioned. The baby …

From nowhere came the thought that, if their baby had been born, it might have had the same pale, devastating eyes as its father and suddenly it felt as if the sides of the room were closing in on her, taking all the daylight with them, making it difficult to breathe.

‘How dare you?’

If she had thrown the words at the wall opposite, it could hardly have responded less. Pietro’s reaction was to narrow his eyes until they barely gleamed from behind the darkness of his lashes as he sat back in his chair, watching and waiting.

‘I have my name to protect.’

‘But you can’t really think that I would do anything to damage it?’

When Pietro blinked slowly and eased his position in the chair, he looked like nothing so much as an indolent lion, lazily considering the question of whether it was worth the trouble of pouncing. There was enough controlled menace in his stare to make her reach for her water glass and snatch at a quick gulp of the drink so as to ease the uncomfortable dryness of her throat.

‘And can you say the same for your boyfriend?’

‘What boyfriend?’

She didn’t give Pietro the chance to answer that, rushing on instead in her determination to refute his implied accusations.

‘Just who do you think I am? I have had nearly two years apart from you. Two years! And in all that time did I so much as give an interview or get my picture in a magazine?’

‘You didn’t have your freedom then,’ he drawled coolly. ‘And you had a comfortable allowance that meant you needed to keep me sweet.’

‘No, I didn’t. Do you ever check your bank statements?’ Marina challenged when one black eyebrow lifted in a cynical questioning of her assertion. ‘Or do you find it hard to notice when a paltry million is missing—or not—from the many hundreds of millions you have coming in and out each month?’

That had him finally sitting up straight. The flash of anger in the glare he turned on his lawyer was so sizzling that for a second Marina almost expected to see the elegant Matteo shrivel into a pile of smoking ash right where he sat.

‘I said …’ Pietro began, but a strong sense of fair play had Marina rushing to the other man’s defence.

‘Oh, I know—I can imagine what you said, or rather ordered, would be done. And I’m sure that poor Matteo did just as you commanded. But you can’t order me around. I’m not married to you now.’

Pietro’s beautifully sensual lips twitched into a wry smile that mocked her passionate outburst.

‘Are you implying that I was ever able to order you around?’ he enquired sardonically. ‘Because believe me, bella mia, that was never the case. In truth, I doubt that anyone has ever been able to order you to do anything. So are you claiming that you never used the allowance?’

‘No—I’m not claiming!’ Marina pushed back the annoying strand of hair that had worked loose from her ponytail with an impatient movement. ‘I’m telling you: I never used the allowance you sent. Not a penny.’

‘Why not? That money was for your keep.’

‘Why not? I would have thought that was obvious. I don’t need to be kept. I have a job—I went back to the library. I earn my own living. I don’t want anything from you. I never did and, now that we’re not married, I never will.’

‘Might I remind you that we are at present only separated?’ There was an odd edge to Pietro’s voice, one that roughened it shockingly at the edges. ‘We are not yet divorced.’

‘Not yet,’ Marina admitted. ‘But it can’t come soon enough for me. I just want it over and done with—signed and sealed so that I can get out of here with my freedom and never look back.’

‘In that case,’ Pietro returned imperturbably, ‘perhaps you will let “poor Matteo”—’ he echoed her words mockingly ‘—get on with things.’

But Marina had had enough.

‘No, I don’t think so. I don’t think we will “get on with things”.’

She pushed back her chair, thought about getting to her feet and then hesitated. A few moments more and it would have had much more effect. She was actually quite enjoying seeing Pietro off-balance for once. He didn’t quite know how to take her—and for now that was exactly how Marina wanted it.

‘What things, Pietro?’

She directed the question straight into his watchful face, seeing the faint scowl that drew his dark brows together, frowning over narrowed eyes.

‘What things—more terms? More conditions? More dictates from the great lord and master, Il Principe D’Inzeo?’

‘Marina …’ Pietro’s use of her name was low-toned, deep, a strong note of reproof on the single word.

‘More “thou shalt do this” and “thou shalt not do that”? “Thou shalt not speak to the press”? Do you really think I’d want to let the scandal mags know the truth about our marriage?’

She was letting her tongue run away with her but somehow she couldn’t even bring herself to care. This was why she had come here, why she’d felt she had to put herself through the ordeal of seeing Pietro one last time. She had wanted to try to voice—partly, at least—the things she had never been able to say when they had been married. To try to provoke him into reacting, into something other than the carefully measured, icy distance that was all that he had showed her in the end. All that the once heady, burning passion had burned down into, cold and ashy.

‘Do you think I’d want the whole nasty, miserable mess spread out in the tabloids—our dirty washing hung out to dry in full view of the public?’

‘Marina …’

It was definitely dangerous now, definitely a warning. His eyes were blazing cold fury, and the hand that had held the water glass now drummed a warning tattoo on the polished table-top. But it was a warning Marina was well past heeding. She had the bit between her teeth, and she wasn’t going to be called to order by anyone.

‘You think you can toss me some instructions and if I want your money I’ll do as I’m told, will follow your conditions to the letter?’

‘I think you’d better listen to what those conditions are.’

‘No.’

Marina shook her head firmly, sending her auburn ponytail flying with the deliberate emphasis she put on the movement.

‘I don’t need to hear them.’

She heard Pietro’s breath hiss in sharply, watched his sharp, white teeth snap together and the muscles in his jaw tighten ominously.

‘Marina—you came here so that we could discuss the terms of our divorce in a civilised manner.’

‘No.’

‘No?’

That really shocked him and the flood of triumph she felt as a result had a devastatingly intoxicating result, rushing through every nerve and vein like the powerful effect of some richly potent brandy.

‘No—that’s not what I came here for. In fact these “discussions” are nothing to me. Because, you see …’

Now was the time for her to get to her feet, and she pushed back her chair so that it almost overbalanced with the force of her action. Now was the time for her to stand upright so that Pietro had to look up to her as she straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin and looked straight down her nose at him.

‘I only have to follow your instructions, agree to your conditions, if I want anything from you. That was the bargaining card you thought you held—the one that gave you some sort of power over me. But you were wrong.’

Stooping to pick up the document case she had brought in with her, she turned it in her hands until it was just in exactly the right position. Her defiant green eyes met his coldly assessing blue ones with as much determination and strength as she could muster.

‘You only hold those bargaining cards if I take anything at all from you—that’s what you counted on, and that was where you went wrong. Because you see, Your High and Mightiness, Principe Pietro Raymundo Marcello D’Inzeo, I want nothing at all from you—nothing.’

She had to pause for breath there, and when she did she expected that he would break in on her, that he had to say something. But still Pietro sat immobile, still as a sphinx. He barely even seemed to be breathing, he was so motionless, so ruthlessly in control. Only his eyes burned with something so fierce, so dangerous, that just for a moment Marina’s heart lurched, her nerves stuttering. Then she pulled herself together, drew a deep, unsteady breath and rushed on.

‘I came here today not to discuss terms but to give you them.’

Zipping open the leather case, she pulled out a sheaf of papers that exactly matched the ones in front of both Pietro and Matteo, the ones from which the lawyer had been reading the list of conditions.

‘I’ve seen your offer of a divorce settlement and I’ve decided to reject it—totally and completely.’

At last Pietro moved, even if it was only his mouth that opened to speak in a voice that was deadly and low.

‘Then you’ll get …

‘Then I’ll get exactly what I want, husband dear—exactly what I came here to tell you I’ll take from you—and the answer is nothing. Absolutely nothing. Because I came into this marriage with nothing and I’m going out of it with exactly the same. So you can take your divorce settlement and put it—put it wherever you like. Because I want none of it!’

As she finished speaking, she tossed the documents down onto the table in front of Pietro where they landed with a heavy thud, the impact throwing up the loosened pages and sending them flying up into the air—straight into her husband’s icily controlled and rigid face.