Bound By The Marcolini Diamonds. Melanie Milburne
as she was, she knew enough about him to know he would be everything a woman could want in a sexual partner: demanding, exciting, daring and dangerously attractive. The one kiss they had shared had shown her that and more. It had sent shooting sparks from one end of her body to the other, licking her senses into a frenzy of want. She could feel the pulse of her blood now, hectic and overly excited at his nearness. Her eyes went to his mouth, his fuller lower lip drawing her gaze like an industrial-sized magnet. All she had to do was step up on her tiptoes and their mouths would touch and burn…
The sound of other guests spilling out of the house was the only thing that saved Sabrina from making a total fool of herself all over again. She pulled out of Mario’s hold and slipped into the passenger seat, her legs still trembling long after he had stridden around and got in behind the wheel of her four-cylinder car.
Once he was sitting beside her, she suddenly realised how very small her car was. It was like a child’s toy; although he pushed back the driver’s seat to its maximum distance from the wheel to accommodate his length, every time he worked the gears she was aware of his suited arm within touching distance of her thigh.
‘I thought you would have hired some swanky Italian sportscar while you are here,’ she said once they were on their way. ‘Isn’t that what rich men like you do?’
‘I saw no need to waste money on one when I was only going to be here for such a short time,’ he answered evenly.
Sabrina chewed over that for a moment. ‘What if I hadn’t agreed to your plan?’ she asked, not trusting herself to look at him.
‘Then I would have found some way of convincing you,’ he said, equally smoothly.
This time she did look at him. ‘With blackmail, like you did with Ingrid and Stanley Knowles?’
He met her eyes for a brief moment, before turning back to the traffic. ‘I see no reason not to use a bit of pressure when it is warranted,’ he said.
Sabrina huddled in her seat, wondering how far he would have gone to make her change her mind if she had said no—not that she’d really had a chance to say no. Ingrid had come in and the words had tumbled out of Sabrina’s mouth, words that now tied her to a man she knew so little about.
It was a disturbing thought. All she knew was Mario Marcolini was ruthless in business and equally so in his private life. Women came and went from his life like clouds in the sky, none of them lasting long enough to make an impression on him. She wondered if he had been hurt by a past lover, or if he was just one of those men, all too common these days, who shied away from commitment. All she knew about his background was what Laura had told her in snatches, and, because Sabrina hadn’t wanted to sound too curious, she hadn’t asked the questions she had longed to know the answers to. Questions she had no right to even be thinking, let alone asking.
‘Where to from here?’ Mario asked when he came to a crossroads.
‘Turn right at the next lights,’ she said. ‘My flat is in the fourth building on the left, but really I don’t think it’s such a good idea for me to move into your hotel with—’
She stopped when she saw a news van parked outside her building, the cameras already being set up. ‘Oh no…’
‘Put your head down and ignore them,’ Mario said as he parked the car in the tenants’ parking area behind the tired-looking inner-city building. ‘I will deal with them while you go in and pack what you need. I can always send someone over later to get the rest.’
Mario fielded the press with a few short statements about his intentions, even embellishing the facts a little for his own amusement. He watched as the news team drove away a few minutes later, and then with a sigh of satisfaction turned and entered the building.
Sabrina’s flat was neat and tidy inside, but he could see why she had always sought employment in the upper echelons of society. Like the many gold-diggers he had met or had dealings with in the past, she was obviously looking for a way out of her current situation. A rich man, even if he was married, could set her up as his mistress. Things had backfired on her with Howard Roebourne, but no doubt there would be other rich men once he put an end to their temporary marriage, Mario thought sceptically.
‘How long have you lived here?’ Mario asked as she came out with a battered suitcase into the tiny lounge area.
‘A couple of years,’ she said. ‘I’d like something bigger and in a nicer suburb, but there’s really not much point when most of the families I have worked for have required me to live with them for extended periods.’
‘It must at times be difficult to have a private life when you are living with other people,’ he said, taking the bag out of her hand and placing it near the door. ‘No wonder you have been tempted to work and play under the same roof.’
Her grey eyes flashed as they hit his. ‘You think I’m a slut, don’t you? And yet the papers are full of your sexual exploits. Your double standards make me sick.’
‘I have not resorted to sleeping with married women,’ he said. ‘I have plenty of single and unattached ones to work my way through first.’
She swung away from him, snatching up her handbag and hoisting it over her shoulder. ‘I suppose you have a revolving door on your bedroom?’ she said, flashing him another glare.
Mario grinned at the thought. ‘Not yet, but it sounds like a great idea,’ he said.
Her glare intensified. ‘I think you are disgusting,’ she spat. ‘You have no morals. You probably don’t even spare the women you bed with another thought once you have done with them. It’s such a shallow and selfish way to live.’
‘It is no more shallow and selfish than touching what does not belong to you,’ he pointed out.
‘You know nothing about me,’ she said with a mulish jut of her chin as tears welled up in her eyes. ‘You think you do, but you don’t.’
He pushed himself away from the door frame where he had been leaning. ‘I know what Howard Roebourne told me about you.’
Sabrina felt her face drain of colour as her heart began to pound sickeningly. ‘H-how do you know him?’ she asked.
‘The business world is not as big as you might think,’ he answered. ‘Roebourne and I move in the same financial circles. I happened to run into him at a corporate function when I was here the last time.’
‘W-what did he say?’ she asked, even though she wasn’t sure she really wanted to know. After that last horrible scene with her previous employer, she could not think of a single thing he could say that would paint her in an attractive light.
‘Nothing I had not already worked out for myself,’ he said with an enigmatic smile.
Sabrina silently ground her teeth. So that was why he had allowed her to kiss him on the day of Molly’s christening, to see if what he had heard about her was true. Her shameless grasp at him hadn’t done her any favours, she realised now when it was far too late to do anything to change things. If he had only suspected she was a wanton woman before, her behaviour at the christening would have been more than enough confirmation that his suspicions were accurate. She had acted so out of character that day. She had blamed the three glasses of champagne she had consumed, but she had only drunk them out of sheer nervousness in his presence.
It had started the day of the wedding when he had captured her gaze and held it. Something had passed between them that day, something visceral. And then at the christening it had been activated all over again by Mario’s debonair charm, his lethally attractive smile, and the sensual glide of his hand on her bare arm as he had taken the baby from her. She had felt it as soon as his eyes had locked with hers, drawing her to him, holding her, making her burn for him as if he had turned on a switch inside her body. Try as she might, she hadn’t been able to locate it since and turn it off. She had felt that same tingle of awareness even when his name had been mentioned, let alone standing in his presence as she was doing now.
‘Are