Czytaj książkę: «Married For The Italian's Heir»

For Mum

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Brides for Billionaires

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

Copyright

PROLOGUE

Two months ago

PIPER LOST ALL sense of reason as his kiss seared her skin and his accomplished touch brought her body to life in a way she’d never known. The pain and grief that this day held for her were blotted out as he whispered words of Italian that sounded romantic, but she had no hope of understanding them.

She gloried in his embrace, for the first time in many months feeling treasured, wanted and needed. What would come after this moment she couldn’t think about now. She didn’t want to face the emptiness. All she wanted was to abandon herself to this man and his passion, to yield to his kisses and give herself utterly and completely to the moment—and to him.

She gasped in frustration as he stopped kissing her. He pulled away and looked down at her, his sinfully dark caramel eyes full of desire—for her. Empowered by this, she smiled at him, unable to hide the longing that was tearing through her faster than lightning. She’d never been desired by any man, and had certainly never been kissed the way he had just kissed her. But, more than that, it was the way she wanted him to kiss her again and again.

This man was a skilled lover, and the way he was looking at her now, with raw lust that vibrated through the semi-darkness of the hotel room, she knew there was no turning back—not that she wanted to. The attraction between them had been too fierce, too strong, even before he’d suggested they leave the party.

Tonight she would give herself to this man. But she was well aware there wouldn’t be a tomorrow. She might be an innocent woman discovering the pleasure of a man’s touch, but she knew not to expect more. She’d worked as a waitress at many society parties in Sydney and in London and she had recognised him as a playboy—a man who wanted one uncommitted night of passion, who loved and left women. Tonight she didn’t care about her dream to settle down with the right man. Tonight she wanted the wrong man.

She wanted to drown her sorrow in the passion even she couldn’t deny, which had ignited between them from the very first moment their eyes had met as he’d arrived at the party. It had arced between them as if they were meant to be here together, caught up in a moment of passion which would surely change her...change her life. How, she didn’t know. She just knew that this moment was one she had to explore.

He touched her face, tracing the pad of his thumb down her cheek, and she closed her eyes as her knees threatened to give way. He pulled her closer, holding her tightly with one arm, keeping her body pressed against the hardness of his, making her virginal body pulse so wildly with unquenched desire it was as if the conclusion of the kiss was already sealed. As was her fate.

‘Before we go any further, do we need protection?’

His husky and heavily accented voice shimmered over her, and her senses were so confused by the desire which burned through her Piper couldn’t think straight.

‘Protection?’ The whispered word sounded so seductive she could hardly believe it was her voice. How had the sensible and shy woman she usually was become such a seductress?

‘I intend to make love to you, cara.’

He slipped off his suit jacket in a purposeful way which made her heart race as much as his words did. All sensible thought vanished from her as she watched him turn and toss it onto a nearby chair. His white shirt was bright in the partial darkness of the room.

She quivered with anticipation as he stepped back to her, excited and terrified about what would happen next. With deliberate slowness he took her in his arms again and kissed her. Then his hand moved down her neck and along her shoulder, slipping under the strap of her dress, sliding it away. As his lips followed the blazing trail of his hand she let her head fall back and gave herself up to the abandonment of the moment.

‘Sorted...’ She gasped the word as his kisses moved down her neck, hardly able to think straight because of the fire each kiss ignited within her.

‘Then there is nothing to stop us.’

With unnerving ease he pulled the zip at the side of her dress and the black silk slithered down her body. The heat of embarrassment rushed over her, and she watched his face as he touched her breast, his fingers concentrating on the hardened peak of her nipple, making her gasp with pleasure. Then he lowered his head and teased the other nipple with his tongue until she thought she might explode with pleasure.

‘That is so...’ She closed her eyes as heat seared within her, unable to say anything else.

‘Do you want me, cara?’

His warm breath increased the sensation of delirium as his tongue teased her nipple.

‘I want you...’ She struggled to say the words as he continued to work his magic. She entwined her fingers in his thick hair, not wanting him ever to stop. ‘To make love to me.’

He laughed softly against her breast, the sensation making her writhe against him.

‘I can think of nothing better, you little tease.’

His accent thrilled her as much as his words, intensifying this new and exciting need inside her, pushing the real Piper further away.

‘Now.’ She pulled him close against her, wanting to feel his body, to taste his skin. ‘I want you now.’

A soft, sexy laugh escaped him and he let go of her briefly, putting her at arm’s length. The black silk of her dress slithered to the floor in a pool around her feet, leaving her in skimpy black panties and strappy sandals.

His dark gaze roved over her near nakedness and the air between them sparked with desire. A flash of her usual shyness threatened, but she pushed it back, refusing to allow it into this moment, and reached for him. Her need to see more of him and touch him made her pull so hard at his shirt buttons they popped off.

His feral growl of pleasure pushed her on, making her want him, want this even more. She couldn’t stop now—couldn’t be her usual cautious self and spend the rest of her life wondering What if? Tonight she would experience ‘What if?’ She couldn’t let this moment go by without responding to it.

In a movement so swift, so decisive, he pushed her back onto the bed, pulling off his white shirt and exposing his muscled torso, dusted in dark hair. Then, with a wicked gleam in those devil-may-care eyes, he removed every last scrap of clothing from his glorious body.

She watched, entranced and excited, as he stepped towards her, towering over her. She trembled in anticipation as she lay there, his gaze never leaving hers. Her heart pounded so hard she was sure the whole of London could hear it, and a sigh of pleasure escaped her as he lowered himself over her, the hardness of his arousal almost too much.

He spoke again in Italian as he kissed down her throat and she ran her hands over his strong back, pressing her nails into his skin. But still it wasn’t enough. Still she wanted more.

Driven by a powerful need she no longer had any control over, she slipped her hands between their bodies and he lifted himself slightly, allowing her to touch him. She wanted to feel him, to torment him as he’d done her. But still it wasn’t enough. She wanted to remove the last barriers of clothing and feel him touch her intimately before possessing her completely.

Urgency took over and she clung to him, raising her hips, her body begging his for release and the oblivion of passion. She wanted him so much. It was as if she’d been waiting for this moment—for him.

‘Dio mio. You are a goddess sent to torment me.’

His guttural voice together with his insistent kisses up her neck was almost too much, and she knew that it had to be now—that they had to come together, that there was no turning back.

He moved, clasping his hands around her wrists and pinning her arms either side of her head. The wild look in his eyes was as terrifying as it was exciting. His breath was coming hard and fast as he fixed her with those dark, sexy eyes. She lifted her hips, clasping her legs around him as her need to be one with him increased.

Another curse left his lips and he let one of her arms go as he raised his hips and ripped her black panties from her. Her shocked gasp only encouraged him further, and he barely paused as she pressed her nakedness against him, feeling the heat of his erection intimately.

‘Per Dio.’

The words rushed from him as she moved, bringing them together. He thrust into her, her startled cry making him stop. She glanced up to see a furious frown on his handsome face, but she couldn’t let it end there. She wanted total possession. She wanted him to take her, make her his. Even if it was only for tonight.

‘Don’t stop.’ She lifted her hips, taking him deeper inside her as she raised her head and pressed kisses against his chest, tasting the salty tang of desire on his skin.

‘You’re a...’ he whispered hoarsely.

But she pressed her lips against his, hiding the truth as she used the unrelenting need in her body and lifted herself up to him, making his possession deep and powerful, forcing him to surrender to the moment too.

Another feral curse left him as he joined her in the frenzied dance of sex. It was so exquisite, so much more than she’d ever dared to hope it could be, that as she hovered on the brink of oblivion she cried out, holding him tight against her as several tears escaped, sliding down her face. She buried her face against his chest, inhaling the sexy scent of him, knowing it would be etched in her memory for ever.

As would the moment she’d lost her virginity, becoming a real woman with a man whose name she didn’t even know.

As her heart rate slowed and his body relaxed she moved, but he caught an arm around her, pulling her close against him. ‘You are not going anywhere yet, cara.’

Those sultry words made her mind spin—as did the reality of what she’d done. Through the fog of desire rational thought was finally becoming clear. She’d lost her virginity and jeopardised her new job—all for a man who hadn’t even bothered with the pleasantries of an introduction. His kisses and soft words had seduced her on a day when she was at her most vulnerable, a day when she needed to know she was alive, prove she could be a woman in charge of her life.

His breathing deepened as he slept, and even though her body was held tightly against his Piper knew she had no option but to leave. She might have experienced the most wonderful night, but this wasn’t who she was.

She slipped carefully from the bed and quietly gathered her clothes, dressing in the near darkness. He stirred and she looked at him—at his handsome face, his lean body partially covered by the white sheet—committing it all to her memory, because this was a man who didn’t want anything other than casual affairs. Despite her naivety, she knew this.

Quietly she left the room of the man whose name she didn’t even know—the man she would never see again as she returned to being the shy woman who’d arrived in London from Australia only a year before.

CHAPTER ONE

FURIOUS AT THE way his life had begun to unravel over the last two weeks, Dante Mancini pushed back the effects of too much whisky at last night’s impromptu meeting. He tried not to think of the outrageous solution Benjamin Carter had proposed to counteract the damning article Celebrity Spy! had run.

The scandalous piece—naming himself, Ben Carter, Sheikh Zayn Al-Ghamdi and Xander Trakas as the world’s most debauched bachelors—had done untold damage to their favourite charity, The Hope Foundation. Now those who ran it had demanded they clean up their acts or step aside as patrons. To make matters worse, a business deal he’d been working on was in danger of collapsing because of the damage to his reputation—he was a bachelor who played the field and now everyone knew it.

Could Ben’s idea work? Would taking such drastic action as marriage divert unwanted attention from the charity and secure his most lucrative business deal yet? Possibly. But was he prepared to take the gamble...?

Dante pushed open the door to his office building, not bothering to remove his sunglasses and definitely not ready to admit that the copious amount of whisky he’d drunk whilst being told he needed to find himself a wife was the reason for his fierce headache and foul mood.

He stabbed at the button to call the elevator and inhaled deeply as he waited, still fuming that Bettino D’Antonio was pulling out of the deal because he, Dante Mancini, and his company didn’t uphold family values.

As the doors to the elevator swished open he walked in, desperate for a moment of solitude before he entered the suite of offices which served as the headquarters for his self-built global business empire dealing in renewable energies. In a bid to bring back some control and chase away the threatening headache he inhaled deeply once again.

The doors closed and instantly his senses were on alert. His memory rushed back to an illicit night of hot sex in a London hotel with an unknown redhead who’d haunted his dreams and stalked his thoughts each day ever since.

She had been wild and passionate, and yet as he’d made her his he’d realised she was a virgin. A fluid curse left him as the elevator doors closed, trapping him inside with a memory which only added to his unaccustomed bad mood. It irritated the hell out of him that those gorgeous green eyes continued to haunt him and that, despite the alcohol still in his system from last night, his blood heated at the memory and a shot of lust hurtled round him.

‘Maledizione.’ He never thought of a woman once their affair was over, and the redhead encounter had been two months ago. Well and truly over.

He clenched his hands into tight fists at his sides. Now was not the time to become embroiled in memories of one meaningless night. He had to remain in control—focus on the matter in hand. He couldn’t allow that piece of gossip in Celebrity Spy! to jeopardise one of the biggest deals he’d ever gone after, or to tarnish the work of the charity he helped to fund. But neither was he about to be dictated to by Benjamin Carter. He had absolutely no desire to settle down in that very elusive state of marital bliss just to salvage his reputation. There had to be another way and he’d find it—of that he was sure.

Not a moment too soon the elevator doors opened and he left the memory-evoking scent of perfume and marched into his office. His head thumped mercilessly from last night’s excess of whisky and his temper was frayed from the latest developments on the deal.

His secretary jumped up eagerly as he stormed in but he refused to indulge in his usual morning pleasantries. He didn’t have the stamina for niceties right now. All he wanted was total silence and coffee—strong and black.

‘I don’t want to be disturbed.’ He snapped the instruction at her as he strode past her desk, desperate for the solitude of his office with its sought-after views over the old quarter of Rome.

‘Signor Mancini...’ she began, overriding his instruction, and he stopped and looked at her, about to open his office door, glad of the sunglasses he still wore.

The last thing he wanted his secretary to know was that he was suffering from an uncharacteristic over-indulgence of alcohol. After his meeting with Ben and the others he’d managed to catch an hour or two of sleep during the overnight flight back to Rome on his private jet, but that hadn’t helped dull the effects of the whisky. All he needed was to be left alone.

‘No calls. No meetings. Nothing.’ He threw the words at her and as she took a breath to protest turned from her and burst into his office. He slammed the door and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. The world had gone mad. Everything he’d worked so hard to achieve seemed in danger of falling to pieces around him.

He muttered a curse and strode across his large office, pressed the button on his coffee machine, then stood at the windows looking out over the city that had at first been a hard and demanding mistress but was now one of only two places in the world where he felt completely at ease.

As the welcome aroma of coffee filled his office he heard movement behind him and tensed. He turned slowly to see just who it was in his office, aware now that his secretary’s unusual insistence on speaking to him must have been to warn him that he had someone waiting for him.

What he didn’t expect to see was the flame-haired siren who’d haunted him since that night two months ago, when she’d slipped from his bed in the early hours, long before he’d woken. Not something he was accustomed to.

‘I hope you don’t mind that I waited in here for you...’ The redhead’s soft voice wavered with uncertainty and, dressed in jeans and a navy knitted poncho, she certainly didn’t resemble the glamorous self-assured beauty he’d bedded that night. But then she hadn’t been all she’d pretended to be that night, had she? She hadn’t been an experienced seductress. She’d been a virgin. A fact she’d kept from him until it had been too late.

He pulled off his sunglasses and looked at her. How had she found him? How did she know who he was? Those few hours in his hotel room had been so passionate, so filled with lustful need that they hadn’t even exchanged names, let alone phone numbers.

Icy-cold fingers of dread clutched at him. Was she here to use that story in Celebrity Spy! for some kind of blackmail? Did she want to sell a kiss-and-tell story? Was that why she’d come to Rome unannounced? To demand money from him for her silence?

‘As a matter of fact I do.’ The angry bitterness in his voice barely concealed his disappointment at this realisation. He’d placed her on some kind of pedestal since that night, his thoughts constantly returning to her like a lovesick teenager. She’d got to him in a way no other woman had come close to doing. Even now his blood heated at the knowledge that she was so close, just as it had when he’d smelt the lingering trace of what he now knew to be her perfume in the elevator moments ago.

She stood up and he let his gaze travel quickly down her jean-clad legs, remembering how they’d felt as she’d wrapped them around him. Savagely he dragged his mind back to the present. Dwelling on one night of sex was not in his nature.

‘What do you want?’ He fired the question at her.

‘I just have one thing I need to say and then I will go.’

Her voice still held uncertainty and her face looked pale. Was that just because she wore hardly any make-up?

She looked totally different from the seductress who’d tempted him from the party that night, and she stood before him now looking every bit the innocent and inexperienced virgin she had been when he’d taken her to his hotel room. But she wasn’t a virgin any longer. He had been her first lover and he wanted to know why she had kept that from him. The question wouldn’t come. As she looked at him he sensed something much bigger, much more threatening.

‘How much?’ he demanded, narrowing his eyes as he tried to gauge her reaction, angry that he’d put himself in this position, that he hadn’t exercised his usual caution where women were concerned.

Her delicate brows flew together. ‘How much what?’

He stepped closer and the scent of her perfume teased at his memory again. He closed his mind to the images which threatened to engulf him. The woman who stood before him now was very different from the woman who’d teased him until he’d all but lost his mind as well as his control.

He sighed and walked towards his desk, tossing his sunglasses down before leaning on its solid wood, fixing her with a hard glare. ‘How much do you want? For your silence?’

‘I’m not about to tell the world,’ she snapped back at him, her voice full of injustice.

He only just managed to stifle a smile. The fiery redhead had briefly surfaced from behind the façade of unassuming inexperience she had adopted.

‘Then why are you here, cara? And, more to the point, how did you find me?’ Already he was bored with this conversation. His head thumped cruelly and he wanted nothing more than to sit down in silence. He had a deal to salvage and he didn’t need Little Miss Shy adding to the mix of hurdles he had to power over.

‘There was an article...’ she said softly as he walked back towards the windows.

He turned to face her and noticed how she followed his every move, turning herself slightly to maintain eye contact with him. It made him suspicious.

‘I’m more than aware that there was an article,’ he growled back at her, the tension in his head reaching almost breaking point. This tedious conversation should have ended when she’d named her price—right before he threw her out. So why hadn’t she? More to the point, why hadn’t he thrown her out?

‘That is how I got your name.’ He raised his brows as she blushed before continuing. ‘We didn’t exactly have time to exchange details.’

Exchanging details had been the last thing on his mind. All he’d wanted was her naked and beneath him. He’d been rash and uncontrolled. Hell, he’d even taken her word that she was on the pill. Something he’d never succumbed to, no matter how deliciously tempting the woman.

‘True, but we had much more fun that way, did we not, cara?’ He smiled at her, allowing himself to remember her eagerness, her insistence which had so turned him on, testing his control beyond its usual limits.

‘Piper.’ Her eyes narrowed as she glared at him, the green depths of them sparking wildly.

‘Piper?’ he repeated, his mind still not able to function as it should. Hell, he hadn’t even had an espresso yet to banish the remnants of whisky, even though the welcome aroma now filled the office.

‘My name is Piper. Piper Riley.’

He nodded. ‘And now that we are both in possession of each other’s names, perhaps you’d tell me exactly why you are here.’ Once again he moved across his office and glanced at the woman who’d been just the redhead in his mind until today. As before, she moved to face him. Now she had a name would she continue to linger in his mind so temptingly? He hoped not.

‘I needed to see you because...’ She faltered and he folded his arms across his chest, becoming increasingly irritated by the conversation.

‘Dio mio. Just say what you have to say and leave. I don’t have time for games.’

‘Very well.’ She stood taller, lifted her chin a fraction and looked directly at him. ‘I’m pregnant.’

Dante had thought the previous twenty-four hours had been filled with nothing but trouble, swallowing up his usual cavalier attitude. He had never expected—or wanted—those words to be said to him. He couldn’t be a father—not when he’d already proved his inability to look after anyone.

‘How?’

The word shot from him before he had time to think, time to compose himself, but she stood resolutely before him. Even the heated redness which rushed over her pale face for a second time didn’t alter the fact that she had suddenly become bolder and more confident—much more like the woman he’d made love to that night.

* * *

Piper held her ground, remaining rigidly still, focusing her full attention on the man whose baby she was carrying. A man whose reputation had been plastered all over the tabloids in recent weeks, one of the world’s most eligible and debauched bachelors. He was far from ideal father material, but she couldn’t deny him the knowledge that he was going to be a father—much less deny her child the right to a father.

She watched him as he prowled around his office, oblivious to the fact that the coffee he evidently needed was ready. He looked as immaculately stylish as he had the night of the party. The only difference was the hint of stubbly shadow at his jaw and the lines of tension on his face, which stirred her sympathy. But she couldn’t let sentiment get in the way. Not now she knew exactly who she was dealing with.

‘I think we both know how.’

She couldn’t believe the seductive purr which wrapped around those words as she looked at him, wondering just what kind of effect this man still had on her. Her heart raced wildly and her stomach somersaulted. She wasn’t at all convinced it was just her nerves at the situation. It was the darkly passionate man she’d lost her virginity to—Dante Mancini. A playboy and exceedingly proud of it, if the article she’d stumbled across in Celebrity Spy! was to be believed.