The Italian Duke's Wife. Penny Jordan
there must be someone—’
‘Many someones,’ Lorenzo stopped her sardonically. ‘Unfortunately they would all want what I do not want to give—it is amazing how easily your sex claims undying love when money and social position are involved.’
‘You mean you would be targeted by fortune-hunters?’ Jodie guessed shrewdly. It was obvious, after all—not just from his car and his clothes, but more betrayingly from his manner—that he was wealthy. ‘Is that why you want to marry me, because a fake marriage will keep them at bay?’
‘Not exactly.’
‘Then why?’
‘It’s a condition of my late grandmother’s will that I either marry within a certain time of her death or I forfeit…something that means a great deal to me.’
Jodie’s forehead crinkled into a small frown.
‘But why on earth would she do that? I mean, either she wanted you to inherit whatever it is or she didn’t.’
‘The situation is more complex than that, and involves…other issues. Let us just say that my grandmother was persuaded to do something that she thought was in my best interests by someone who was following their own agenda.’
Jodie waited for him to continue, but instead he reached for her hand. ‘Give me your car keys and—’
She gave a small, determined shake of her head. ‘No.’ If she wasn’t already totally off men for life, this man and his unbelievable arrogance would surely be enough to put her off them, she decided angrily.
But at the same time an insidiously tempting possibility had begun to form inside her head. What if she were to agree, on condition that Lorenzo escorted her to John and Louise’s wedding? With the whole village invited, two extra guests wouldn’t cause any problems…and, yes, she admitted it, there was a part of her that was sore enough and woman enough to want to be there, showing the world and the newly married couple that not only did she not care about their betrayal, but that she had a new partner of her own. Wasn’t there a saying, ‘Living well is the best revenge’? And how much better could a discarded and unwanted fiancée live than by showing off her new, better-looking and far more eligible man? A man, moreover, who desperately wanted to marry her!
She was wrenched out of this mental triumphant return to the scene of her humiliation by Lorenzo’s arrogantly disbelieving voice. ‘No?’
It was ridiculous that she could even contemplate doing something so shallow, and it showed the effect that just a few minutes in the company of a man like Lorenzo was having on her. She was not going to let herself listen to the urgings of her pride. Leaving it and her conscience to wage war on one another with an undignified exchange of inner accusations, she tried to do the sensible thing, and told Lorenzo firmly, ‘Even someone as…as arrogant and used to getting what they want as you seem to be must see that what you’re suggesting just isn’t—’
‘A million isn’t enough? Is that what you’re trying to say?’
Her face burned. ‘The money has nothing to do with it.’ The cynical look he gave her at that made her burst out angrily, ‘I can’t be bought. Not by John, and certainly not by you.’
‘John?’
He hadn’t pounced so much as leapt on her small betrayal, and now he was looking at her as she imagined a large sleek cat might look at a mouse it was enjoying tormenting.
But she was not a mouse, and she wasn’t going to be either bullied or tormented by any man ever again.
She lifted her head and told him coolly, ‘My ex-fiancé. He offered me money, too, but he was offering it out of guilt, because he didn’t want to marry me, not as a bribe because he did. He wanted me to be the one to break off our engagement, so that no one could accuse him of dumping me. Obviously you both share the same male mindset. Like you, he thought that he could buy what he wanted, regardless of what I might be feeling.’ Despite her attempt to appear unaffected by what she was revealing, a mixture of sadness and cynicism shadowed her eyes. Her mouth twisted slightly as she added, ‘In a way, I suppose he did me a favour. Knowing that he thought so little of me that he would buy his way out of our relationship made me realise that I was better off without him.’
‘But, despite that, you still want him.’
The unemotional statement made her heart thud nauseatingly inside her chest.
‘No!’ she said quickly. ‘I do not “still want him”.’
‘So why have you run away, if it is not because you are afraid of what you still feel for him?’
‘I have not run away! I’m having a holiday, and when I go back…’ The small involuntary movement that caused her shoulders to droop as she contemplated returning home was more telling that she realised. When she went back—what? She had no job to go back to. Not now. And no home—she had, after all, sold her cottage, and even if she had not done so she doubted that she would have wanted to live there, with all its memories of her false happiness. But she could go back with her head held high and on the arm of a man she could truthfully say was going to become her husband, she reminded herself.
And then what? He had already told her the marriage was only to last twelve months.
Then she would shrug her shoulders and say, as so many others did, that it hadn’t worked out. There was far less shame in that than there was in being labelled as a dumped reject.
‘In twelve months’ time you could go back with a million pounds in your bank account,’ she heard Lorenzo saying, as though he had read her mind.
It was so tempting to give in and agree. And she resented him for putting her in a position where she was tempted. What had she promised herself about never being manipulated by a man again? Gritting her teeth, Jodie pushed herself back from the edge of giving in.
‘If you really want a wife,’ she told him crossly, ‘then why don’t try finding one without using your money? Someone who wants to marry you because she loves you, and believes that in you she has found a man who loves her back, a man she can respect and trust, and…’ She saw the way he was looking at her and shook her head. ‘Oh, what’s the use? Men like you and John are all the same. He only values the kind of woman he can show off, the kind of woman who makes other men envy him, and you only want the kind of woman you can buy so that you can control her and your relationship with her. Well, I am not that kind of woman. And, no, I will not marry you.’
As she turned away from him Lorenzo could feel the anger surging through him. She was refusing him? This…this too-thin nobody of a tourist—a woman who had been rejected publicly by the man who had promised to marry her? Didn’t she realise just what he was offering her or how fortunate she was? Marriage to him would transform her instantly from an unwanted dab of a woman into the wife of someone wealthy enough to buy her ex-fiancé a hundred thousand times over. She would instantly be raised to a social height most women could only dream of, she would be courted by the famous and the rich, and, if she was intelligent enough to capitalise on what he would be giving her when their marriage was over, she could find herself a new husband. Any amount of men would be only too willing to marry the woman who had been selected by a man like him. All she had to do in order to totally transform her life was agree to be his wife.
And yet, instead of recognising her good fortune, she was actually daring to take it upon herself to lecture him! Well, she was no loss to him. She wouldn’t have lasted a day, not even twelve hours once Caterina had got her claws into her, and he was a fool to have wasted his time on her in the first place. He could drive down to the coast and find a dozen women within one hour who would jump at the opportunity she had turned down.
‘Fine,’ he snapped, turning his back on Jodie as he strode back towards the Ferrari.
He was leaving her here? He couldn’t—he wouldn’t! Jodie’s eyes widened in mute shock as she watched him walk away from her.
‘No, wait!’ she called out, as