A Passionate Revenge. Sara Wood
sake he had swallowed his pride and accepted Willoughby’s offer of money so they could fly out and start a new life.
Going back to the old man, cap in hand, was one of the lowest moments in his entire life and he wanted to wipe it from his memory.
For a split-second he contemplated telling her all this, but he decided not to bother. She’d find out in time. Then he checked himself, frowning as he remembered Willoughby’s stroke.
Dannazione! He’d wanted Anna to hear what Willoughby had said from the old man’s own lips. Now what chance did he have?
He scowled in frustration. One way or another, he’d find a means to make her confess that she’d planted the money. Then he’d explain why he’d accepted Willoughby’s bribe. Perhaps he could approach her a different way. Use the highly charged sexual attraction that still, inexplicably, lay between them.
Anna watched the changing emotions on his face warily. At first she thought he was going to bluster that he was innocent, but then he checked himself and said something else that threw her off balance completely.
‘Allow me to compliment you on your new nose.’
She blanched and her fingers flew to it for reassurance that he wasn’t mocking her. It was an automatic reaction. She still found it hard to remember she looked relatively normal now.
‘It makes you look very beautiful.’ Despite the slivers of dark anger in his eyes, his tone throbbed with a carnality that swept over her like a suffocating blanket.
And her body responded with longing even while her head told her that he was playing some nasty little power game. She shuddered, fear crawling all over her.
‘So I’ve been told,’ she said flatly.
His eyebrow lifted. The downward sweep of his dark lashes alerted her to the fact that he was checking her left hand for signs of a ring. But she didn’t wear it when cooking or gardening. And she wasn’t going to prolong this conversation any longer.
The coldness of her silvered eyes ought to have given him frostbite. But his mouth had softened and the sensuality of his thoughtful expression slid effortlessly into her hungry body. Helpless to resist, she almost wished she still loved him. At least that would have given her an excuse for the raw, ungovernable feelings that were taking her over.
She had never ached like this. Never wanted to leap on any man—let alone Vido—and beg for sexual release. The violence of her need, and the accompanying hatred, shocked her. Mentally she was kissing the contours of his face; those raw cheekbones, the pure line of his beautiful jaw.
Had she inherited her mother’s uncontrollable passions that had shocked her grandfather? She’d heard so many stories of her mother’s inappropriate behaviour—though to Anna, her mother had sounded like fun.
The impromptu parties. Dancing on the lawn at midnight. Running barefoot in the snow. Kissing her father enthusiastically at every opportunity. A woman of passionate feelings that were never curbed. Was it possible to inherit such feelings?
All she knew was that her desire for Vido was running away with her, making her want to kick the traces and fling off the restraints she’d imposed on herself all these years.
The need to be physically caressed by a man—and this one in particular—was frightening her. She screwed her fingers into tight fists. Years of containment ensured that she fought through the too-enticing haze of desire that slithered into every corner of her body. And for her own self-preservation, she turned herself to stone.
‘Don’t keep London waiting,’ she said coolly.
There was that mocking twitch of his mouth again. She felt a weird surge of excitement. It was as if he felt challenged by her and was contemplating a battle between them, to assert his will over hers.
In his dreams! Reserved though she might be, she wasn’t a pushover. He’d get no satisfaction from taunting her.
Hopefully he’d get bored and go soon then she could run indoors and beat the life into some bread dough to release her pent-up anger. And, she thought in despair, to ease the desolation of her untouched body.
‘We’ll meet again,’ he said, his eyes dark with lustful promise.
She struggled to catch her breath. ‘Not if I see you first,’ she said with quiet fervour. ‘This has not been a pleasure.’
‘It has for me,’ he murmured and the air fizzled between them setting her pulses leaping erratically. ‘And it will be even more enjoyable next time. That’s a promise.’
The threat alarmed her. Confused by his low, husky tone, she swivelled around so she didn’t have to look at his dark and broodingly handsome face any more.
As she buried her head in a clump of blowsy daffodils, she listened hard, her breath held until her lungs were bursting. First she heard his footsteps, light and easy as he strode away. Then the thud of the car door slamming, followed by Vido’s murmur and a tinkling female laugh.
Anna let out her breath in a rush of venomous loathing and gritted her teeth. He’d be gone in a moment and that would be that. An engine thrummed throatily, the sound increased in volume and then died away.
Suddenly the air seemed to clear of tension. Her scrunched-up muscles stopped screaming at her as she relaxed them. Unsteadily, she got to her feet and stumbled indoors, feeling as if she’d been caught in a washing machine on high spin. Her hands were shaking. Legs, too.
Ridiculous! He had such a terrible effect on her and for no reason at all. He had been in the wrong. She was the one who’d been his intended victim.
Wincing, she remembered how, after he’d fled to Italy, it had seemed that everyone at school had ganged up on her. She’d been bullied so unmercifully that eventually she had left school and her grandfather had grudgingly paid for private coaching.
It had been awful. Even more isolated than ever, she’d only been able to forget her unhappiness when she was cooking. And once her nose job had been successfully completed, she’d enrolled in a catering college, where she’d shone for the first time in her life.
Anna grimly scrubbed her hands and reached into the cupboard for a mug, desperate for a coffee. Preferably laced with an entire bottle of brandy, she thought ruefully.
The very core of her body ached and throbbed. It was a physical feeling entirely new to her and she hated it—hated her defencelessness against Vido’s potent masculinity. It meant she was as capable of being desperate for loveless sex as Vido. And what did that make her?
Shuddering, she boiled the kettle and made her drink.
‘Wretched man!’ she muttered venomously, spooning in far too much sugar in her distraction. ‘Just don’t cross my path again. My life’s enough of a hell as it is.’ Too furious to think straight, she took a sip of coffee and gasped as the scalding liquid burnt her mouth. ‘Damn you, Vido!’ she seethed, slamming the mug down so hard that coffee splashed over her hand. She swore. And had to choke back unexpected tears.
Pain, she told herself grimly. Not misery or longing. Just anger and pain. She didn’t do self-pity any more.
CHAPTER TWO
‘VIDO? They’re ready for you.’
Sorting a stack of papers, he nodded curtly at Camilla, who’d popped her head around his study door. ‘I’ll take a quick look at them.’
‘Do that. You’ll be fascinated,’ she drawled, looking amused.
Seeing that his PA wasn’t going to elaborate, he rose and headed for the office, thinking that it was good to be settled here at last.
For the past two months since he’d bought the house for Solutions Inc, the British branch of Il Conciliatore, he’d been busy in London closing down his office there and juggling his clients. At the same time, he’d been handling the renovations at his new base in Shottery