The Tuscan's Revenge Wedding (10 page)

“That’s different,” he said with instant rejection in his
voice.

Amanda could not quite see how. Did he mean she would not be
around long enough for Carisa to become attached? Or did he think she would
soon be revealed, along with Jonathan, as an enemy of the family?

He had a solution of some kind in mind, she was sure; he was
not a man who did things without planning.

Amanda had the feeling she was being maneuvered into
agreement again.

The problem was she could find no good reason to resist.

5

Nico spent the afternoon in his study with
phone and laptop as he attempted to catch up on matters of business that had
been neglected in the past two days. In the way of such things, it required
more time than expected. He had thought to visit the hospital with Amanda
again, stopping off for dinner before their return to the villa. When he
emerged from his paperwork, it was too late for that program. He was also told
that Amanda was lying down in her room, presumably asleep.

Her fatigue was almost certainly from stress, plus the shadows
under her eyes suggested she’d not slept in the hours before lunch. Nor had he,
if it came to that, something that might now be corrected.

Picking up the phone, he spoke to Carita’s doctors, also
those looking after Jonathan Davies, and received the expected report that
nothing had changed. Giving orders that neither he nor his supposed fiancée
should be disturbed, he mounted the stairs to his bedroom, showered and
stretched out on the bed.

He was perhaps overtired after long hours without rest, for
he couldn’t drop off to sleep. He kept seeing Amanda Davies staring at his
naked body, wide-eyed, flushed with embarrassment and what he dared hope was
something more. He would have loved to take her hand and draw her back into the
shower with him. It would be a new experience for her, or so he liked to think;
she had the look of a woman whose sexual appetites had not been awakened. She
would require careful initiation in these matters, just as he meant to slowly
cultivate her appreciation for fine wine.

What would she do, he asked himself, if he soaped his hands
and laved her body, every curve and hollow, while claiming the sweetness of her
mouth? Would she moan and allow him access, or would he have to entice her to
open to him? Would she complain that her hair was getting wet, or glory in the
warm wetness that sluiced over them, around them? Would she urge him on as he
pleasured her with his mouth or would she attempt to prevent it? And would she
cling to him, crying out, as he took her against the tiled wall, plunging into
her again and again?

Per l'amor di Dio
, he muttered, turning to his
stomach in hope of subduing his throbbing erection. It was insane to torture
himself with such visions. She was forbidden to him unless she decreed
otherwise, and he must accept it.

He had flung down his challenge before her, but had little
hope she would bend to pick it up. If she did, now that she had seen the villa
and recognized the extent of his wealth, he would be forced to consider the
cause. How was that for trapping himself in a hell of his own making?

No, this charade of an engagement they had stumbled into
would play itself out after a few days. Carita would awake, begin to heal, and
that would be the end of it.

Well, it would be the end unless his sister married Jonathan
Davies. If that happened, Amanda would become an official part of his family.
What then?

Jonathan’s sister might visit on occasion. The families
would mingle during holidays, and he and Amanda make polite conversation across
a table or with the width of a sofa cushion between them. They would go their
separate ways then, always wondering what it might have been like if they had
abandoned principles and prohibitions and taken each other to bed.

If he could not have Amanda, he could at least have the
fantasy. Rolling to his back again, he clasped his hands behind his head and
allowed her phantom to come to him, gloriously naked, moist, hot, and with
silvery promise in her eyes.

Ah, but that way lay torture, pure and simple.

With the contraction of powerful muscles, he heaved off the
bed. He shook himself like a dog getting rid of stiffness then padded toward
the bathroom.

It would be best if Amanda woke, after all. Sleeping too
many hours now would only delay her adjustment to the current time. He would
send someone to rouse her, and they would make a brief hospital visit, just
long enough to make certain all was well. Dinner afterward might be late by
American standards, but not by his.

The sooner Amanda adjusted to Italian time, Italian ways,
the better it would be. He was sure of it. Why he was so sure was something he
refused to examine.

~ ~ ~

It was the sound of laughter that drew Nico
out of his office on the following morning. He paused in the tall, open doorway
of the back entrance that gave onto the terrace. What he saw stunned him into
immobility.

Amanda sat with Carisa and Yolanda, his young sister’s
companion who was serving as translator, at the table under the grape arbor.
The sunlight through the leaves made dappled patterns on their skin, formed
tiny spotlights that glowed in their hair. They had eaten breakfast, for
stacked plates sticky with the remains of sliced fruit had been pushed aside,
along with a basket holding the crumbs of rolls, a chocolate service and a
small coffee service. The three young women seemed to be experimenting with lip
gloss, for Amanda was using a fingertip to paint Carisa’s willing mouth a soft
shade of pink.

The process tickled, or so it seemed. His little sister kept
giggling and ducking her head so Amanda, laughing as well, got the gloss on the
end of Carisa’s small nose and had to wipe it away.

Nico’s chest felt tight as he listened to the mingled
sounds. Carisa laughed so seldom, and almost never when he was present. It was
good to hear her. He was also touched and gratified to see her interacting so
naturally with Amanda. Yet it seemed near unbearable that Carisa should be
carelessly happy while her twin still lay in a deep coma.

“What’s going on here?” he asked.

The laughter stopped, perhaps because his voice was gruffer
than he’d intended. Carisa looked up at him, her eyes going round with surprise
and something like alarm. With a small gasp, she clamped a hand over her lips
as if to hide them from him.

“Having a lesson in makeup,” Amanda answered with an
uncertain smile as she glanced from him to his sister. “Carisa has never used
gloss or mascara. Can you believe it?”

“Why not, when she has no need for such things?” He strolled
toward them while noting that Amanda still wore her prim navy blue skirt. She
apparently had yet to explore the additions to her wardrobe that had been
delivered while they were away the evening before.

“I like it, Nico,” Carisa protested, her gaze darting
between him and Amanda as she gauged his displeasure. “My lips are very kissable
now. Mandy said so.”

“Did she?” he asked in hard inquiry on the very heels of the
translation Yolanda provided.

“It’s the name of the gloss, Nicholas,” Amanda told him,
color rising in her face as she picked up a napkin to wipe the oily residue
from her finger.

“Nico,” Carisa corrected, “you must call him Nico!”

“She suggests a name change for me,” he said, speaking above
Yolanda’s literal translation as Amanda met his gaze with a question in her
eyes. “It seems reasonable, under the circumstances.”

“The circumstances?”

He glanced at Yolanda, but the companion had begun clearing
away the clutter of cosmetics now that he had taken her job. “Our engagement,
if you will recall?”

“Oh. I suppose.” She hesitated. “And Carisa has been calling
me Mandy, like my brother.”

“Charming,” he drawled, “but for myself I like Amanda.”

She glanced away, and he almost smiled at that small crack
in her composure. It was momentary, however.

“About the lip gloss, I can show you the
Kissable
label on the pot.”

“
Kissable
,
Kissable, Kissable,
” Carisa sang to
herself. Shoving away from the table, she slid off her chair. Running the few
steps to where he stood, she held up her face and closed her eyes. “It tastes
good, Nico. Want to see?”

It was his usual habit to brush a quick kiss of greeting on
either cheek. He would not alter that affectionate ritual. Putting a knuckle
under Carisa’s plump little chin, he turned her head, saluting her soft face on
either side. Only then did he touch his forefinger to her lips and carry a
smear of gloss to his tongue.

“Hmm, yes, sweet.” His voice sounded strained to his own
ears, the effect of the desire that slammed into him as he thought of licking
that same flavor from his guest’s mouth.

“It’s watermelon!” Carisa informed him, smacking her lips as
she danced a small, happy jig in front of him.

“But I hope I am the only man with whom you intend to share
this watermelon flavor.”

“
Si, si!
” Carisa gave a gurgle of laughter. “Other
men, strange men, are yuck! Not at all kissable.”

“Yuck?” he repeated, a smile tugging at his mouth for the
gusto with which his young sister brought out that idiomatic expression.

“That’s what Amanda said!”

“Ah.” He glanced at his guest to see how much of this
exchange she had followed, suspecting she might understand something of it
because of the word she must have taught Carisa. Speaking to his young sister
while holding his guest’s gray gaze, he asked, “And am I yuck to Amanda?”

“No, silly, she is your
fidanzata
,” his sister
crowed. “You can’t be yuck. And you must kiss her good morning, too.”

“I should do that, you think?”

Carisa nodded with great emphasis. “You will like it. Truly.
Amanda tastes good, too, but different, like strawberries!”

Yes, he would most certainly like it. Strawberries were his
favorite fruit, or might well be after this little episode. The gods were being
kind that they provided such a fine excuse for carrying out his most fervent
impulse.

With one arm around Carisa, he moved toward the table where
Amanda sat. She eyed his advance with close attention while pushing back her
hair, tucking it behind one ear. She looked distinctly skittish, as well she
might if she’d caught anything of Carisa’s suggestion.

He gave her no chance to retreat, but bore down upon her
with a steady stride. As he halted beside her, he reached to circle her narrow
waist with his arm. “
Buon giorno
, good morning,” he said in husky
greeting, and set his mouth to hers.

~ ~ ~

Amanda had been almost sure Nicholas — Nico
— meant to kiss her. She guessed it from the exchange with Carisa, but saw it
too in the devilish glimmer, half amused, half daring, in his dark eyes. If she
had been certain, she might have evaded him by retreating behind the table. As
it was, she barely had time to draw breath before she was pulled up from her chair
and against the hard length of his body.

She expected a quick, half humorous meeting of mouths.
Instead, he brushed his lips over hers with slow purpose. The very edge of his
tongue feathered their surfaces with wet heat as he tasted her. A low hum of pleasure
sounded in his chest, its vibrato throbbing into her breasts as he held her
close. Her lips throbbed, softening under his as a peculiar exhilaration swept
through her. She pressed her hands to his wide shoulders, intending to push him
away.

Through her mind, in that instant, ran the fragment of a
dream that had jerked her awake in the night, one of being pursued, captured,
drawn into his arms like this while her clothes mysteriously disintegrated. She
had twisted, naked and exultant in his hold, and so awash in desperate desire
that the mere memory of it left her flushed and breathless now.

“Nico?” Carisa said.

He made no answered, didn’t appear to notice when his young
sister ceased pulling on his shirt, distracted by the sweet roll her companion
offered her.

He shifted, thrusting his fingers through Amanda’s hair,
cupping the back of her head while he slanted his mouth over hers. She
remembered to breathe then, inhaling quickly through nose and mouth. He took
instant advantage of that parting of her lips. Slipping inside, he twined his
tongue with hers, abrading its tender underside, enticing it into his mouth the
better to invade hers with his sweet, enticing flavor.

He was so solid against her, so muscled and hard in all the
places where she was not, subtly dominating with his superior height and
strength. His scent surrounded her, compounded of the soap from his morning
shower, his elusive cologne and clean male. She breathed it deep inside while
intoxicating heat seemed to melt her very bones, and her resolve along with
them.