The Platinum Collection

So tense she could barely catch her breath, Jess gazed back at him and despised herself for playing that card when the flickering obstinate heat of arousal was shimmying through her pelvis like a mocking touch. In a movement that took him as much by surprise as it took her she shifted up against him, stretched up on tiptoe and pressed her soft mouth to his.

A masculine hand curved to her hip to crush her against him. Her heart thumping feverishly fast, she gasped as he drove his tongue between her lips in a delving, erotic assault that set up a jangling response throughout her entire susceptible body. Suddenly she wanted him more than she had ever wanted anything in her life and with a hot, sweet longing that came dangerously close to an edge of pain.

‘There will be other nights,’ Cesario quipped, lifting his handsome dark head, his dark eyes sardonic, and setting her back from him before walking to the door.

Trembling, senses awakened and cruelly crushed again, Jess studied the space where he had been and thought what a disastrous note she had chosen to begin their relationship on.

I don’t want you when you’re intoxicated and unwilling…

 She cringed, despising herself for not being tougher. She had signed up for the marriage and cheating didn’t come naturally to her. It didn’t matter if Cesario loved Alice. It didn’t even matter if he was convinced that Jess was a sulky, uptight bride and a flirt at her own wedding. They had had an agreement and she had just welched on the deal, and nobody could have been harder on Jess than she was on herself while she finally struggled free of her gown, washed off all her fancy make-up and climbed into the big bed alone. There she lay with her eyes wide open because whenever she tried to close them the room revolved behind her lowered eyelids in the most nauseating way…

CHAPTER SIX

ALMOST unrecognisable in a stylish white linen skirt and top teamed with a bright turquoise jacket, sunglasses anchored firmly on her nose, Jess boarded Cesario’s luxurious private jet in teeming rain the following afternoon. He had left the hall that morning to fit in a business meeting in the City before his departure.

Jess was still suffering from a hellish hangover and she had barely slept during the previous night. At some point during those slow-passing hours she had grudgingly acknowledged the truth of Cesario’s criticism of her mood the day before. She had got the dream dress, the gorgeous groom and the fabulous ceremony, but she had not got the love, the caring or the happy-ever-after that brides looked forward to receiving. As a result, disillusionment and a horrid sense of being trapped had dogged her throughout her wedding day. It was as though the true cost of marrying Cesario di Silvestri had only really hit home after she and he had made their vows. But she had made an agreement with him and she would stick to it from here on in, she assured herself fiercely.

Cesario stepped onto the jet, his keen gaze shooting straight to the petite brunette seated in a comfortable tan leather upholstered seat. ‘Jessica…’

Tensing, Jess looked up warily, worried about the reception she might receive after events the night before. ‘Cesario…’

‘I think we can do without the sunglasses,’ he said wryly, with a nod in the direction of the rain streaming down the nearest porthole.

Jess breathed in deep and removed the tinted spectacles, knowing her eyelids were pink and puffy in spite of the make-up she had applied.

‘And please let your hair down. I love your hair,

mia bella,’

 Cesario confided as though that were the most normal thing in the world for him to say to her.

‘It’ll be a mess,’ Jess warned him, pink warming her cheekbones. Wanting to match his generosity in not holding onto any spite, she reached up and dragged the band out of her hair so that her curls tumbled free to her shoulders. ‘I couldn’t be bothered to do anything at all with it today, which is why I put it up.’

At that frank admission a slanting grin curved his wide sensual mouth. He bent down and fluffed her mass of curls round her anxious face with gentle fingers. ‘It doesn’t need anything. It looks great just as it is,’ he contended. ‘I like the natural look.’

But Jess didn’t think Cesario would recognise ‘natural’ unless it hit him in the face; he had probably never been exposed to the real thing. She suspected that more than one woman had gone to bed with Cesario fully made up and just as many had sneaked out of bed early the next day to ‘brush up’ before he got a first look at them. She had noticed the very high levels of grooming amongst the female wedding guests and had appreciated that just to pass muster in such company she would have to make much more effort than she was accustomed to with her appearance.

‘About last night,’ she began awkwardly.

‘Forget about it. Today we start again—fresh page, open book,’ Cesario pronounced smoothly, sinking down in the seat opposite her and buckling up for the take-off. She found herself covertly watching his every fluid movement. The smooth bronzed planes of his high cheekbones framed his straight, strong nose and the sensual perfection of his full-modelled mouth. By the time his lashes lifted to reveal his dark golden eyes as he tilted back his dark head to address the stewardess, Jess was staring helplessly: he was a heartstoppingly handsome man.

‘Tell me about where we’re going,’ she urged, keen to find out about their destination and talk to him for a change.

‘Collina Verde…it means “Green Hill”. It’s the country house where I spent my earliest years with my mother. It’s in the hills above Pisa and very beautiful,’ he murmured softly.

Jess recalled him telling her that he had grown up without a mother and scolded herself for having made no attempt to learn more about his background. After all, it was on the basis of such little nuggets of information that most relationships were built and life would be easier for both of them if she made the effort to be more interested. ‘What happened to your mother?’

Cesario compressed his lips, his dark eyes taking on a grim light. ‘She died from an overdose when I was seven years old.’

Jess was taken aback by that uncompromising admission. ‘That is so sad. It must’ve been very hard for you to handle that loss at such a young age.’

‘I blamed my father. He had had a string of affairs and they were living apart by then,’ Cesario mused wryly. ‘But he had a great line in self-justification: he said it was in the blood and that I would be exactly the same.’

Jess was too craven and too tactful to dare to comment on that issue. ‘What was it like for you when you had to live with your father instead?’ she asked curiously.

His dark eyes gleamed like polished bronze and he gave her a wry half-smile.

‘Dio mio.

 He wasn’t cut out to be a family man any more than he was fit to be a husband. He resented being tied down. He was very competitive with me and it got worse as he aged and had to face that his youth was gone. Nothing I achieved was ever quite good enough.’

In recognising that he came from a much less happy and secure background than her own, Jess had plenty to think about during that flight. After a light early supper they landed in Pisa at the Galileo Galilei airport. Though it was by now early evening, it was a good deal warmer than it had been in London and the sun was still shining by the time the waiting limousine wafted them in air-conditioned comfort deep into the Tuscan landscape. She had expected lovely countryside but she sank into another dimension of appreciation entirely at her first glimpse of the most distant rolling hills and the serried green ranks of the grapevines, softened here and there by the silvery clouds of foliage that distinguished the olive groves. All the buildings, fashioned of pale apricot-coloured stone, seemed ancient and the medieval towns and villages on the hilltops were impossibly picturesque.

Collina Verde sat on top of a hill ringed by woodland, and although its sheer size made it imposing it was a less formal property than she had expected. A fortified farmhouse composed of several rambling buildings, it sat with its castellated roof below a blue and gold evening sky and enjoyed the most breathtakingly timeless view she had ever seen. She got out of the car, still entranced by the outlook of the mountains and the valley below, and enjoyed the light breeze that lifted her hair back from her brow and cooled her warm skin.

‘It is lovely,’ she remarked, and then a chorus of familiar barks sounded and she jerked round in disbelief to see her six dogs pelting frantically across the paved courtyard towards her in noisy welcome. ‘My goodness, how on earth did they get here?’ Her attention flipped to Cesario. ‘You arranged this?’ she queried in visible disbelief.

‘With the help of your mother. I know you planned to leave them behind with your rescue animals and I’m sure they would have been well looked after but I know how attached to them you are,’ Cesario advanced, considering himself to be well rewarded by the shining look of appreciation etched in her face.

‘I’m just…stunned!’ Jess confided, hunkering down to be engulfed in a wave of wet noses, scrabbling paws and noisy greetings.

Cesario had suspected that the white outfit would have a limited shelf life with his bride and his worst expectations were fully met by the time Jess straightened again to head for the front door, her pack of dogs prancing round her. Her skirt had acquired dusty paw prints and damp patches and her top was speckled with dog hairs but she gave him a huge smile that let him know that, while the designer wardrobe worth many thousands had failed to impress, his gesture in flying her pets out to Italy had won him his highest yet approval rating.

‘I mean, I know you’re not a doggy person,’ Jess pointed out breathlessly. ‘Which is why it was such a particularly kind and thoughtful thing to do—’

‘And not what you expect from me,

piccola mia?’

 Cesario completed silkily.

‘Well, no, it wasn’t,’ Jess agreed without hesitation. ‘But I was wrong.’

Cesario was honest enough to feel a shade guilty, for all he had done was issue instructions to his staff, who had taken care of all the official hassle required to transport the dogs abroad on pet passports.

‘Hugs gets so upset when he doesn’t see me,’ Jess explained, fondling the nervous wolfhound’s ears while it gazed up at her adoringly. ‘And Magic gets frustrated when he can’t communicate.’

Cesario frowned, studying the Scottish terrier currently playing dead on the ground with four paws stiffly extended so that his tummy could be tickled. ‘How does he communicate?’

‘He’s deaf and the man I hired to look after the sanctuary didn’t know any doggy sign language,’ she proffered, making a signal with one hand that made the terrier roll over and sit up, his little black beady eyes pinned to her.

Cesario was impressed by the demonstration. ‘I’ve never really had a pet. My father disliked animals,’ he told her, curving a hand to her elbow to walk her into the house. ‘The closest I ever came to it was having a horse.’

They stepped over the greyhound, already fast asleep in the lengthening shadows cast by the wall. Weed, the thin grey lurcher, pushed his long narrow face into Cesario’s hand and Jess stared in surprise. ‘My goodness, Weed must like you. Someone once treated him badly and he rarely approaches anyone for attention.’

Resisting the urge to snap his fingers in dismissal of such notice, Cesario entered his Italian home with Weed sticking as close to him as a shadow. His housekeeper, Agostina, welcomed them all indoors, and as soon as introductions were over Jess surrendered to curiosity and wandered straight off alone for a tour. It was an atmospheric house, gently aged and respected and full of charm. Worn terracotta tiles that gleamed stretched underfoot, while wooden ceilings vaulted above big airy rooms furnished with light and colourful drapes, comfortable sofas and plain pieces of solid country furniture. A series of tall narrow doors stood wide open onto a terrace overlooking the valley and a table and chairs sat in the inviting shade of a big chestnut tree.

Pausing only to instruct the dogs to stay and not to follow her, Jess headed up the stairs. Their luggage had been parked in two different rooms, she noted, unsure whether she was pleased or not with the boundary that was being acknowledged. Business, not pleasure, she told herself resolutely, but it was an unfortunate thought, for she did not like to think that her body had anything to do with a business agreement. Seeking a distraction, she peered into the first of a set of magnificent marble bathrooms fitted out in opulent contemporary style. She took off her jacket and walked out onto a wrought iron balcony to enjoy the view.

‘You will have to be careful not to get sunburned in this climate,’ Cesario remarked, making her jump, for she had not heard his approach.

Jess swivelled round. ‘It’s an absolutely gorgeous house,’ she told him with enthusiasm.

An indolent smile curved his darkly handsome lips. ‘I’m glad we can agree on that. I had it updated last year and it is the perfect spot for a honeymoon.’

The colour of awareness flickered into her cheeks and he stretched out lean brown hands to clasp both of hers and ease her closer.

‘Honeymoon…honeymoon…honeymoon,’ he rhymed teasingly. ‘It doesn’t take much to make you blush,

moglie mia.’

The setting sun cast still-heated rays on her skin, but not as hot and overwhelming as the hungry seal of his mouth over hers in a passionate kiss. The world went into a tailspin as the slow pulsating throb of arousal travelled all the way through her responsive body. Her nerve endings leapt, making every inch of her deliciously sensitive, so that even the hand he smoothed across the swell of her bottom was a source of pleasure and her legs shook beneath her.

His broad chest rising and falling and his breathing fractured, Cesario gazed down at her rapt face, his dark eyes smouldering hot gold. ‘I won’t take anything for granted with you—yes or no?’

And Jess liked that he had still thought to ask the question. He was tugging her indoors out of the fading light and she blinked, long lashes sliding almost languorously up on her light grey eyes and there was no hint of reluctance there. Desire had dug unshakeable little talon claws into her, vanquishing the fear and uncertainty. Her body wanted to connect with his again and strain towards that distant source of satisfaction she sensed.

‘Yes,’ she told him shakily.

‘

Sì

…your very first word in Italian,

moglie mia.’

‘

Sì

…but tell me what you are calling me,’ she demanded as he drew her back to the bed.

‘My wife,’ Cesario translated with assurance, ‘which you are.’

For some unfathomable reason, that was the first time Jess felt truly married. Those words achieved what the pomp and ceremony of the wedding day had not. She smiled, allowing herself to enjoy the warm hum of arousal in her pelvis. She refused to think about her scars, telling herself instead that most people had things they disliked about their bodies and that she was no different. So, she stood quiescent while he removed the linen top to reveal a pretty white and blue bra and then she moved forward and began without hesitation to unbutton his shirt. Her hands grew a little less dexterous as the edges of the shirt fell open to reveal the hair-roughened bronzed flesh beneath.

In acknowledgement of that wave of shyness, Cesario tipped up her chin and crushed her raspberry-tinted mouth below his again, revelling in the sweet strength of her response and the way her fingers dug hard into his muscular shoulders. He kissed her and then he kissed her again, skilfully tasting the voluptuous curve of her lips and the honeyed secret corners of her tender mouth and still he wanted more, wanted everything she had to give with a raw edge to his hunger that was refreshingly new to him. She trembled against him, enslaved by the sexual probe of his tongue darting inside her mouth and the urgent masculine erection she recognised when his hand closed to her hip to crush her against his big powerful frame. Her whole body rejoiced in the effect she was having on him.

As he released the zip on her skirt and it pooled round her feet Cesario lifted her clear of its folds and brought her down on the big wide divan bed crisply dressed in linen. Before he removed his hand he brushed the roughness of the skin on her back and he glanced down in surprise at the long pale scar there.

‘Did you have surgery there?’ he asked.

Jess froze and angled away from him to present him with a defensive spine, only now his attention was fully engaged and he saw the furrow of scar tissue marring the pale skin and he touched it with his finger.

‘Per l’amor di Dio,’

 Cesario exclaimed in surprise. ‘What the hell happened to you?’

Jess flipped back to him and lay flat. She pressed two fingers to the final scar on her midriff and said fiercely, ‘You missed one!’

Cesario focused on that final pale line cruelly bisecting her creamy skin. ‘Those must surely have been life-threatening injuries?’ he breathed starkly, black brows pleated as he studied her with questioning dark eyes that for once had no gleam of mockery.

‘A…knife attack while I was at university. I almost bled to death,’ Jess responded jerkily, and then she folded her lips closed and stared at him and in the depths of her pale glittering eyes he saw her fear that he would persist in his questions.

Cesario contrived to shrug a broad shoulder as though he saw knife wounds on his lovers every day and he half turned away to remove his shirt and kick off his shoes. His expressive gaze was veiled to conceal the true strength of his reaction from her because he was enraged by the image of her being slashed by a knife and helpless. She was so small, so feminine, but maybe those traits had made her a more appealing target, he reflected with grim cynicism.

‘Sorry, I just don’t like to talk about it,’ she said unevenly, one hand curling into a fist on the sheet as if even saying that much was a major challenge. ‘Maybe I should’ve warned you—I know my scars are ugly…’

Having shed his trousers, Cesario came down on the bed beside her and bent his tousled dark head to the scar on her abdomen. Her heart hammered with tension, butterflies fluttering loose in her tummy as he pressed his mouth gently to the slightly puckered skin. ‘Not ugly, just part of you. I’m sorry you suffered an experience like that and I certainly didn’t need warning,

piccola mia.’

He was rarely at a loss for the right thing to say, she thought enviously, only half convinced by his words and gesture that he was not repelled, but the worst of her tension had evaporated. The ferocious tightness of her muscles eased and she rested her head back on the pillow and breathed again. ‘You see, I’m really not a perfect doll.’

‘You’re talking to a guy who wanted you even when you sported a dirty waxed jacket, muddy boots and a team of misfit dogs,’ Cesario reminded her lazily.

‘I’m surprised you didn’t have the dogs booked into the local beauty spa for some grooming,’ Jess teased, balancing on her elbows to stretch up and tilt her parted lips in invitation as though a piece of elastic were pulling her to him to rediscover that warm, sexy mouth of his for herself again.

And that next kiss ravished and seduced and left her dizzy and breathless, wondering where he had been all her life, for no other man had ever made her feel that way. She was already finding out that Cesario was not the guy she had believed him to be. He had much greater depth than she had ever been willing to concede when she reflected on their often spiky exchanges in the stable yard. She had repeatedly failed to look beyond the rich sophisticated façade to the male beneath that glossy patina of worldly success.

Her bra melted away during the kissing and, while he palmed the small pert mound of her breasts, he stroked her pointed nipples and captured them between his lips and sucked until the tingling buds were hard and swollen. Until then, she had not known that she might be so sensitive there. He caressed her until she was gasping for breath and a pool of liquid warmth had infiltrated her pelvis.

‘I want this to be really special for you,’ Cesario husked. ‘But it might hurt.’

‘So, get it over with,’ she urged apprehensively.

Cesario gave her a wicked grin that squeezed her heart inside her chest. ‘Shame on you—that’s the wrong attitude to take. A good lover never rushes a woman.’

He tugged up her legs and skimmed off the white and blue matching knickers, sliding a hand between her slender thighs to find the engorged bud below the black curls on her mound. He teased her with the ball of his thumb and her hips rose off the bed in sensual shock at the sweet erotic surge of arousal. It was almost too intense for her to bear and she was hugely conscious of the surge of moisture there.

Cesario pulled back from her and she studied him with sensually lowered eyelids, taking in the hard sleek contours of his broad chest and the muscles flexing across his flat stomach as he leant back and removed his boxers. He was magnificent and more than a little daunting to inexperienced eyes. He pulled her back to him and studied her with a hint of amusement in his beautiful eyes. ‘I promise to be gentle,’ he intoned, carrying her hand down to his bold shaft and encouraging her to explore his dimensions.

Her hand closed round him, for she was full of desire and curiosity, and she learned that he was strong and smooth, velvet over steel. Answering heat flowered between her legs so that when he took her mouth again with hungry urgency she more than reciprocated the feeling. He began to explore her most secret and responsive flesh, tracing the delicate folds, teasing the nub of her desire and then the damp little entrance. It wasn’t long before little whimpers of sound were escaping her throat, the strength of her wanting making her legs tremble while the unbearable craving and the ache at the heart of her grew stronger by the second. She had not known that anything could feel that powerful and least of all that it might be him who introduced her to the powerfully addictive force of desire.

He taught her to want what she had never learned to want, only wondered about, what she had truly believed she might go to her grave without experiencing, and she had honestly thought that it wouldn’t matter because she wasn’t really missing anything important. So he taught her differently, stroking her with skilful fingers, licking at the wildly sensitive buds of her nipples while he surely, gently prepared her for the ultimate pleasure. But the yearning inside her for more steadily grew intolerable, sharp-edged, greedy and impatient so that she bit in impatient reproach at his lower lip and let her trembling fingers close tight into his luxuriant black hair.

Fluid and strong, he came over her, sliding between her thighs when she was shaking and desperate with pent-up need. She was wildly eager for that first gentle thrust, feeling the stretch of her inner tissue struggling to contain him and then the surge of his hips against her as he drove deeper. It hurt a little more than she had expected and she could not suppress a cry of pain. Instantly he stopped, gazing down at her with those drowningly dark and golden eyes of his that were so beautiful they made her ache.

‘I’m sorry,

moglie mia,’

 he whispered, brushing her tumbled curls from her brow to press a benediction of a kiss there. ‘It will ease…I hope.’

Her inner muscles tightened round him and he groaned with an uninhibited sensuality that thrilled her and he shifted lightly, slowly, sinking into her by erotic degrees until she didn’t know where he ended and she began. But it was an overpoweringly good feeling and she moved sinuously beneath him, angling up her hips to encourage him, all discomfort forgotten. As he withdrew and came back into her, her excitement began to build. Excitement laced with deep, deep pleasure at the motion of him in her and over her. His slow, steady rhythm ensured that the tight feeling low in her pelvis began to expand and spread outward, sucking her into a vortex of intense driving sensation. And then without even knowing where she was going and simply blindly allowing the force of her response to carry her with it, she reached a peak and the incredible waves of pleasure gathered her up and threw her down again on the other side. In a daze she floated back to earth again.

Cesario was watching her with dark, dark eyes when she recovered her senses again and his hand was closed over one of hers, his body hot and damp and intimately masculine against her thigh. She looked back at him with light eyes that still reflected some of her wonderment at what had just transpired. His strong jaw line squared.

‘Don’t look at me like that. Don’t forget our agreement,’ he breathed suddenly, his keen gaze narrowed on her feverishly flushed face. ‘I didn’t ask for your love and I don’t want it. We will share a bed, nothing more, until a child is born,

piccola mia.’

It was like an unanticipated slap in the face for Jess and she went straight into shock, recognising that he, of all men, would recognise when a woman might be getting a little too attached, a little too serious. Her facial muscles tightened, her expression carefully schooled to blankness as a wave of anger and pain broke inside her like a tide crashing on the shore. She would not give him the satisfaction of knowing that he had hit pay-dirt with that cold-blooded warning. She would not respond with the angry resentment that would reveal that he had wounded her.

‘I don’t have love to give you,’ Jess fielded flatly as she deliberately shifted away from him, rejecting that deceptive togetherness for the pretence that it so clearly was. ‘I love my family and my pets and some day I will love my child, but I’m afraid that’s it. I am a very sensible person when it comes to my emotions.’

A slight darkening of skin tone over his cheekbones hinted that she might have touched him on the raw. He screened his gaze and murmured levelly, ‘I just don’t want you to be hurt.’

‘I’m strong, much stronger than you seem to think,’ Jess countered, and then, in a tone of polite enquiry calculated to underline that declaration for his benefit, ‘Are you staying here for the night? Or do we sleep separately?’

Cesario sat up as though she had elbowed him in the ribs. ‘My room is n