Second Marriage. HELEN BROOKS
but he said nothing, and again she felt as though she had somehow been slighted. What an unpleasant individual! She forced herself to look out of the window, keeping her expression blank, although she couldn’t stop the warm colour staining her cheeks pink. What a very unpleasant individual.
She recalled the picture of his wife and felt herself shrink still further into her seat. The Italian woman had been beautiful—very beautiful—in a sensual, feline way that was both slinky and sexy and very, very grown-up. He obviously preferred his women voluptuous and sophisticated, she thought tightly, a description which most certainly didn’t fit her slight, boyish figure and lack of make-up and adornment. Not that she wanted it to, she added instantly, not at all. Romano Bellini was the type of macho man she found positively distasteful—the sort who had to have something decorative hanging on his arm as a reflection of his own masculinity.
‘I understand you worked with Grace when she lived in England?’ His voice was polite but uninterested, and it was clear he was making the effort of conversation without having any desire to do so. ‘As receptionist at a doctors’ surgery, sì?’
‘Yes.’ The reply was a little too clipped in view of the long car journey in front of them, so she modified it with, ‘Although we had both actually trained to work with children—a fact we discovered as we got to know each other better.’
‘This is so?’ He turned to her for one moment, and she felt the jolt of the glittering black gaze right down to her shoes before he concentrated on the road again. ‘But you found it was not to your liking?’ he asked softly.
‘Not really.’
‘You do not like children?’ he persisted.
‘Of course I like children.’ She wished this conversation, which was proving difficult for her, were being conducted with some space between them. The close proximity of their bodies in the car was...disturbing, and the expensive, delicious smell of him combined with the overwhelming maleness of the man was making it impossible to think clearly. ‘It’s just...something happened which made it...awkward to continue,’ she said carefully. Awkward? Impossible, more like. Terrifyingly impossible.
‘I see.’ The rapier-sharp gaze flashed her way again, but she had dropped her head a little, allowing the silky fall of her shoulder-length straight hair to hide her face. ‘Well, perhaps when the twins are here and you have had some practice again you may feel like continuing your career,’ he said quietly.
‘Perhaps.’ The tone and the word were dismissive, and she meant them to be. There was no way she was going to discuss any of this with a stranger. She couldn’t believe she had said as much as she had already, and she certainly wasn’t going to elaborate further.
Five minutes crept by in a silence that could only be called taut, and she was just contemplating breaking the crackling tension with a mundane remark about the beautiful countryside when Romano spoke again, his voice cool and contained. ‘I thought we would stop for lunch at a little restaurant I know along the coast. This is acceptable?’
‘Lunch?’
If he had suggested something obscene she couldn’t have sounded more horrified, and his voice acknowledged his awareness of her consternation as he said, ‘You do eat, I take it?’
Yes, she ate—of course she ate, Claire thought weakly, but the thought of having lunch with him, of being with him like that, was alarming. They hadn’t exactly hit it off—besides which, this invitation to lunch was clearly just part of the fulfilment of his duty to Donato and Grace as far as he was concerned. ‘I...I was expecting to eat with Grace,’ she managed after a few more painful seconds, ‘and I’m not really hungry.’
‘I, on the other hand, am starving.’ His voice held a thread of something she couldn’t quite place, slightly mocking, dry, with a darkness that made warmth trickle down her backbone, and as he spoke he shifted position slightly, bringing the material of his black trousers taut across his thighs.
Oh, help... She took a deep breath and forced her fluttering pulse to behave. What on earth was the matter with her? She’d been alone in a car with a man before, hadn’t she?
Yes, but not this particular man, her mind answered weakly. In fact she’d never met a man like this one before. He was threatening. No, not threatening, frightening. Her first instinct had been right, she told herself helplessly. He was frightening, and dangerous. Too... male.
‘So?’
As the cold voice spoke again she forced her eyes up and away from his body, and tried to bring her thought processes into working order.
‘You would not find it too...irksome to spare a few minutes to satisfy my appetite?’ Her eyes shot to his face now, but the chiselled features revealed nothing but bland enquiry, and the fact that she had put quite a different meaning on his words from their face value brought her colour surging again. ‘I think maybe Grace would expect that I feed you before delivering you safely to her maternal bosom?’
He was laughing at her! At the same time as the realisation washed over her a bolt of anger consumed her nervousness. How dared he? How dared he laugh at her? He clearly saw her as some small, pathetic mouse he found it amusing to ridicule, and now she was quite sure he had meant his previous words to be taken two ways. He had sensed the flustered disquiet he roused in her and was mocking it.
Oh... Her teeth clamped together as another thought hit her. He didn’t think she fancied him, did he? That she’d been bowled over by his considerable physical attraction and synthetic wealth and charm? She’d die if he did.
Her eyes narrowed, and suddenly the words were there, and flowing as coolly and bitingly as ever she could have wished. ‘Of course you must eat, Signor Bellini,’ she said icily, and he glanced at her again, caught by her tone. ‘I was merely anxious that Grace shouldn’t prepare a meal for me and then find I had already eaten, that’s all. I have months ahead of me with Grace and Donato, so time is immaterial today.’
And so are you. She hadn’t actually said the words but they hung in the air as clearly as if she had voiced them. She knew it and he knew it.
‘How gracious,’ he said with a silky smoothness that told her the gauntlet had been acknowledged and accepted. ‘Are all English girls so courteous?’
‘Oh, I’m sure you could answer that question better than me,’ Claire returned sweetly as she glanced with studied casualness out of the car window. ‘You must have known many women, English and otherwise, Signor Bellini.’
‘Must I?’
‘I thought I understood Grace to say your business connections stretch all over Italy and the States?’ Claire said with a wide-eyed innocence that didn’t fool the man at her side for a moment. ‘They must bring you into contact with a great deal of people, surely?’
‘My business connections... Ah, yes.’ The deep voice was wry, and she didn’t like the touch of amusement colouring the dark accent, or the way the undeniable sexiness of the Italian voice made her quiver deep inside. ‘My business connections do prove...tiring at times.’
‘I’m sure they do.’ Her voice was a little more tart than she would have liked; she mustn’t let him think he was getting to her, so she moderated her tone as she said, ‘But then I’m also sure you enjoy your work.’
‘I try, Claire, I do try.’
I bet. An elusively sensual whiff of aftershave touched her nostrils briefly as though to confirm the thought, tightening her lower stomach in a way she could well have done without. But he wouldn’t have to try too hard. Most women would fall into his lap like ripe peaches the moment those velvety dark eyes looked their way, she thought ruefully. But not this woman. Definitely not this woman.
‘Now we have determined what a hard-working man I am, may I ask how...busy you were in England?’ he asked in a soft, taunting voice.
‘Me? Oh, a doctors’ surgery is always pretty hectic,’ she said brightly, deliberately ignoring what he was really asking,