Her Last Night of Innocence

Damn.

Above the upturned white collar of his shirt, a muscle jumped in his freshly shaven cheek as his old friend despair wrapped him in its suffocating embrace. Damn Suki for coming up with the idea of this absurd and completely inappropriate party.

Damn him for going along with it.

Turning away from the mirror, he thrust his hands through hair that was still damp from the shower and exhaled heavily. Pretty much everything he’d achieved in the last twelve years had been as a result of his need to escape his past, but he had always shied away from looking too far into the future. There was no point. His future had always looked dazzlingly assured, so he’d lived in the moment, putting all his energy and his focus into making the most of now.

Death or glory. Those had always seemed to be the potential outcomes for his life. He’d either keep winning until he was ready to stop, or die in a ball of flame. This struggle with demons he couldn’t see, didn’t understand, had never occurred to him as a possibility.

Yanking the tie from round his neck he tossed it onto the bed and walked across the expanse of gleaming wooden floor to the wardrobe—the only other piece of furniture in the huge room. He’d bought the Art Deco villa high in the hills above Monte Carlo six years ago now, but had somehow never got round to furnishing it properly. In the old days before his accident, he had simply been too busy—travelling around the Grand Prix circuits in the summer months, away skiing or scuba diving or training out of season. And since the crash…

Viciously he slid back the wardrobe door and dragged out the battered leather holdall that had accompanied him around the racetracks of the world. Since the crash it had been as if he was waiting, he acknowledged bleakly. Waiting for a thousand bits of jigsaw to fit back together again before he moved on with his life.

Except now it was obvious that it wasn’t going to happen like that, because some of the bits were missing.

Maybe now it’s time to give yourself a rest. Take some time out to think. It’s the best shot you’ve got…

Dr Fournier’s voice echoed inside his head as he pulled clothes from the shelves in the wardrobe, shoving them into the holdall. He was used to packing light and packing quickly, and it took him only a couple of minutes to get together all the things he needed and throw the keys to the chalet on the top. At the first opportunity he was going to get the hell out of the party and drive up to Courchevel.

As he zipped up the bag he allowed himself a twisted smile. For once in his life he was going to do as he was told. Because he intended to beat this memory loss and start winning again.

Whatever it took.

“Night, Mummy.’

‘Goodnight, darling. Sweet dreams…I’ll phone again in the—’

There was a muffled click and then a high-pitched tone that told her that Alexander had hung up already. He’d sounded in great spirits, and although she wasn’t confident he and Ruby would be asleep any time soon, she wasn’t worried about him being miserable either.

That was just her.

She listened to the tone for a few seconds more, unwilling to sever the tenuous connection that had for a few minutes stretched across all the dark miles that separated them. Then with massive effort she pressed the button, tossed her phone into her black velvet evening bag and stood up. Her face in the brightly lit hotel mirror was ghostly pale. Her eyes—by contrast—were enormous and glittering feverishly. Her hair, newly washed, hung loose around her face to her shoulders, kinking horribly because it had dried long before Lisa had finished hogging the hairdryer. Lizzie had shown her how to coil it up and pin it into one of those sexy, wispy styles that other women always seemed so good at, but when Kate had tried earlier her hands had been shaking so much she’d had to give up. Oh, well, it was good to have something to hide behind anyway.

She carefully applied the dark red lipstick Lizzie had made her buy at outrageous expense in the cosmetics hall of Harvey Nichols, and stood back to look at the effect. Oh, God, she had just gone from ghostly to vampire. Dead to undead, she thought, reaching for a tissue and scrubbing it off again. It was no good. Lizzie might have lectured her endlessly on the need to make the most of herself and stand out from the crowd, to maximise the chance of Cristiano Maresca noticing her, but it really wasn’t her.

And last time he’d seen past the terrible prim grey suit and noticed her. No make-up, no cleavage-displaying dress, no killer heels. He’d seen her—the real her—with all her dark fears and anxiety that she spent her whole life trying to hide. And he’d talked to her too, telling her things about himself and his past that had made her heart turn over.

Gesu, Kate, I’ve never…bared my soul like that before.

And that, thought Kate bleakly, pulling open the door and going out into the corridor, was why she had spent the last four years waiting for him. Because when he had told her those things a link had been forged between them that went deeper than the physical. Before she’d met him she’d had so many misconceptions and prejudices about him, and what he did for a living, but he had smashed them all to pieces and let her see the truth.

She got into the lift, trying not to look at her reflection in its mirrored interior in case the longing that was suddenly raging inside her was written all over her face. She mustn’t allow herself to get her hopes up. She had enough to lose tonight without adding her dignity and her composure to the long list.

Alexander, for example.

‘Bonsoir, mademoiselle.’ The young doorman stood aside for her with a flourish, and a blast of icy air made her shiver. ‘Can I get you a taxi?’

‘No, thank you,’ she murmured, looking across the square to where the Casino’s twin turrets pointed upwards at the inky sky. ‘I’m just going…over there.’

‘To the Campano party? Bien, mademoiselle. Enjoy your evening.’

That, thought Kate, going carefully down the steps of the hotel in her high-heeled shoes, was extremely unlikely. But then, she hadn’t come here to enjoy herself. She’d come here for closure.

The square was quieter now. The party inside the Casino had already started, and the photographers Lisa had watched gathering around the entrance earlier, to capture the arrival of celebrities and sports personalities, had dispersed, leaving only a few ambling, curious tourists. Blue lights from the Casino’s entrance bounced off the shiny paintwork of the Bentleys and Ferraris and Lamborghinis that were lined up outside like the forecourt of Alexander’s fantasy garage.

As she picked her way across the wet cobbles, holding her skirt up so it didn’t drag on the ground, she could see through the open doors to rows of marble columns, glowing like gold in the lamplight inside, and hear music—the sexy, high-tempo whine of electric violins.

Oh, God. And now she had to go in there…

It would almost be funny if it weren’t so awful. This wasn’t her world, and she didn’t even want it to be. Much as she grumbled about Hartley Bridge, and the fact that its one shop closed for an hour at lunchtime and sold malt vinegar rather than balsamic, it was where she belonged.

Where she felt safe.

The shivering had turned into a violent trembling that was nothing to do with the cold. High above Monte Carlo, beyond the lights and the noise, the hills were barely distinguishable from the black sky. Somewhere up there was the big empty villa where, on a warm, pine-scented evening in May, her whole life had changed in ways she could never have imagined.

Resolutely she raised her chin. Dominic was right. It was time to take control of things. Things had a habit of happening to her—things out of her control—that served to remind her time and time again of how precarious life was, how fragile and fallible. It was high time she took matters into her own hands for once and faced up to her fears.

Clutching her evening bag in front of her like a shield, she went up the steps and into the gilded and opulent interior.

‘So, what do you think? Do you like it?’

Handing him a glass of champagne, Suki came to stand beside Cristiano at the gallery rail. Above the frantic swell of electric violins he could hear the note of triumph in her voice as she looked down on the scene below.

Like it?

A pulse beat in Cristiano’s temple, out of time with the music. He felt sweat break out on his forehead.

The party was well underway, and the ornate and imposing salon was filling up with guests—some of whom Cristiano knew well from the racing circuit, and others whose faces he knew only from glossy magazines. At the foot of the wide staircase that swept down from the gallery a raised platform had been erected, on which four ravishing beauties with Perspex electric violins prowled and writhed around two cars.

The Campano car that the team would be running during the forthcoming Grand Prix was being unveiled to the public for the first time tonight. A study of design and engineering perfection, its paintwork glittered in the light of the chandeliers like polished emeralds, and its sleek lines were reminiscent of some crouching, predatory beast.

But it was the other one that people had gathered to look at. The obscene lump of distorted metal that had once been a car and had nearly been his coffin.

‘Whether I like it is irrelevant,’ Cristiano said tonelessly, dragging his gaze away from it. ‘Everyone else seems to be fascinated.’

With a hiss of scarlet satin Suki turned, looking at him from under lashes that were too thick and black to be real. ‘They’re glad that you’re back, that’s all,’ she said throatily, reaching up to straighten his collar unnecessarily. ‘You’re a hero. Everyone remembers the accident, but seeing the car like that will bring it home to people how amazing you are to have come back from it.’

Her musky perfume caught in the back of his throat, combining with the despair that lodged there, choking him. Everyone remembered the accident except him. And if Dr Fournier was right that might mean that, no matter how strong he was, it would never come back.

He knocked back a slug of champagne. It had cost Silvio a fortune, but to him it tasted like battery acid.

‘I’m not back yet.’

‘But you will be,’ Suki purred, trailing a scarlet-tipped finger down the silk lapel of his dinner jacket. ‘You were three times World Champion. You just need to get a couple of races—a couple of wins—under your belt. I know it must be hard—’

With a muted sound of disgust Cristiano broke away from her, thrusting both hands through his hair. Apart from Francine Fournier, Suki was the only person who knew about his memory loss, but even she had no idea about the flashbacks and the panic attacks and the palpitations that plagued him when he was driving.

‘You don’t know the half of it,’ he said bitterly.

Below them Silvio was moving swiftly from group to group, beaming as he shook hands with the men and kissed the women, most of whom towered above him in high heels. In a moment he would make a speech, and then after that the guests would disperse into the adjoining salons and take their places at the gaming tables to play poker and roulette. Suki’s theme for the evening had been decided apparently without irony, and the guests were looking forward to celebrating Cristiano’s return by gambling with Campano money.

For him, the stakes were much higher.

‘I’m here for you—you know that,’ Suki said in a low voice. ‘If there’s anything—’

‘The twenty-four hours before the crash,’ he interrupted through tightly gritted teeth. ‘Tell me again. What happened?’

She stiffened slightly, and suddenly her perfectly made-up face was as hard and expressionless as a Venetian mask. ‘I’ve told you,’ she said carefully. ‘There’s nothing more.’

Cristiano’s gaze was inexorably pulled back to the shredded metal and blackened paintwork of the ruined car.

‘Again,’ he said with lethal softness.

He heard her give the merest hint of an impatient sigh. ‘You qualified in pole position. Some girl had come over from Clearspring Water to interview you and I took her to the press suite to wait for you while you went back to have a shower and rest.’ Her tone was nonchalant, almost as if the events of that lost evening were completely inconsequential. ‘One of Silvio’s friends was having a party on a yacht, so most of us had left the Campano building by six. I’m guessing that you must have finished your interview with the Clearspring girl by seven and gone home soon afterwards.’

‘What about the next morning?’

Suki picked an imaginary bit of lint from the front of her very tight red satin dress. ‘Normal race day routine. You arrived at the track—’

‘According to the newspapers I missed the drivers’ parade.’

‘Maybe you were a bit late.’ Suki shrugged. ‘Four years is a long time. I can’t remember exactly what happened that day—none of it seemed to matter compared to what came afterwards.’

The throbbing in his head intensified. The music was building to a crescendo, the violinists thrusting their hips and their bows more and more feverishly as the guests kept coming. Cristiano’s gaze flickered restlessly over all of them, as if he was looking for someone in particular.

‘Was I alone?’

‘When you arrived?’ she said casually. ‘Of course. Why wouldn’t you have been?’

He gave an icy smile. ‘Because the night before a race I usually wasn’t.’

It seemed like another lifetime. When he had driven fast and won races and seduced women all with the same effortless arrogance.

‘Like I said, I was at the party. I didn’t see you leave.’

‘This girl from Clearspring…’

His voice trailed off and his hand tightened on the railing as his restless gaze snagged on something below. Someone. He snapped it back, raking his eyes over the crowd again, trying to locate whatever it was that had caused that sensation like a flashbulb going off inside his head.

Suki gave a dismissive laugh. ‘Oh, please. She wasn’t your type at all,’ she said with an edge of scorn. ‘She turned up wearing some kind of librarian-style grey suit—can you imagine? At Monaco? In May? I’m talking seriously plain and boring—the kind of girl who thinks the best fun you can have in bed is reading a book…’

Cristiano had stopped listening.

He was watching the girl in a dress of clinging blue satin who had just walked through the door and was drifting, like the rest of the guests, towards the stage. The thing was, he wasn’t sure why he was watching her.

Another flashbulb exploded inside his head.

In a roomful of some of the most beautiful women in the world she should have been invisible, but suddenly it was impossible to look at anyone else. She was slight, slender, though the cut of the dress accentuated breasts that looked surprisingly full and lush, and her dark blonde hair was loose and unadorned, curling up slightly at the ends where it skimmed her bare shoulders. There was something very separate about the upright way she held herself, as if she were battling the temptation to turn and run. Her eyes were downcast, her face pale and completely expressionless.

‘Who’s that?’

His voice sounded as if he’d swallowed a razorblade. Suki glanced at him in surprise, following his gaze. ‘I take it you don’t mean the woman in the red Dolce & Gabbana? Because if you don’t know who she is then—’

‘Blue dress.’

‘Oh.’ Suki made the single syllable bristle with disdain. ‘I have no idea—which means she’s probably nobody. The girlfriend of one of the minor mechanics or geeky technicians. She looks vaguely familiar, but I can’t think where I’ve seen her before.’

Cristiano didn’t answer. The girl was directly below them now, so that he could see the satin sheen of her bare back and the raised bumps of her spine.

This time his head felt as if it had been split in two by forked lightning. It was as if the violinists were dragging their bows backwards and forwards over his taut nerves as their music swooped and screamed towards its pulsing climax. He was distantly aware of pain shooting up the tendons in his forearms, and realised he was gripping the railing so hard that his fingers were numb, as if he was trying to stop himself vaulting over it to get to the girl in the blue dress.

She had come to a standstill a little distance away from the platform where the violinists still tossed their hair and swayed between the two cars. Her back was towards him and Cristiano felt his body tightening, hardening, as his eyes travelled down its bare length. Her skin was the colour of old ivory.

And then suddenly she turned, ducking her head and slipping through the crowd that had gathered behind her. Everyone was too preoccupied with watching the violinists and looking at the wrecked car to take any notice of her as she passed.

Except him.

Her hair fell forward over her face, but just as she passed beneath the gallery where he stood she pushed it back, and he saw that the expression on her face was one of naked anguish.

He didn’t think. He didn’t hesitate. Thrusting the barely touched glass of champagne back at Suki, he was moving towards the staircase before she could open her mouth.

‘Cristiano!’ Her voice was high with surprise and indignation. ‘Cristiano—where are—?’

But he had already gone.

Chapter Three

THE car was like some kind of gruesome exhibit from her darkest nightmare. Coming across it like that—incongruously displayed in the opulence of the Casino’s grand salon like some kind of obscene trophy—made Kate feel faint with horror.

She had to get away. People were pressing around her, trying to get closer to look at the lump of twisted metal, their avid faces blurring into one as Kate struggled to push past. The music was loud enough to make the hot air pulse, and the room seemed to tilt and spin so that she couldn’t remember which door she’d come through.

Looking around wildly, she stifled a whimper of panic. Whichever way she turned she seemed to be hemmed in by people—swigging champagne, tossing manes of glossy hair, throwing back their heads and laughing—until she felt as if she was in some grotesque circus. Then miraculously, ahead of her, she saw the tall double doors that led to the lobby. Ducking her head, she gathered up the slippery fall of her skirt and broke into a half-run.

The lobby was empty now, and the cool air from outside fanned across her burning cheeks. The heels of her torturous shoes rang on the marble floor as she headed for the exit, hoping that Lisa or Ian hadn’t seen her and might follow and try to persuade her to come back again.

‘Wait.’

The word was low and fierce. Oh, God, she was even hearing voices now. Echoes from the past. Just as she did so often in her dreams. Any moment now she’d wake up and find herself staring at the ceiling of her cramped bedroom back in Hartley Bridge. Please God—please let her wake up before the part where she had to watch the car he was driving hit the barrier. Turn over. Burst into flames…

‘Wait!’

In dreams things happen in slow motion, and that was how it was then. Strong fingers closed around her wrist and she was being pulled back, a powerful wave of shock jolting through her body and her making her head whip round.

Her breath stopped.

He was inches away from her, his face darker, harder, leaner and even more terrifyingly perfect than she remembered. But it was his eyes that made her poor battered heart turn over as they burned into hers with laser-like intensity.

Her lips parted to speak but no sound came out.

And then…

And then his mouth was on hers, his fingers biting into her shoulders as he gripped her, and kissed her, and she kissed him back with all the pain and loneliness and desperate longing of the last four years. Showers of incredulous joy burst inside her head and spread through her whole body. She felt weak with relief, with joy, as their mouths devoured each other, brutal and ruthless, their tongues probing and fighting, their teeth clashing.

Distantly she was aware of the music coming to a thundering climax, and the eruption of applause—which suddenly got louder as the door behind them opened.

‘Cristiano?’

The voice was sharp and impatient, and Cristiano was lifting his head, pulling away from her, and the real world was rushing back in, in a blur of bright light and noise. He let go of her shoulders abruptly.

Kate staggered backwards, her hands flying to her mouth, which pulsed and throbbed, covering the incredulous smile that she couldn’t suppress. A beautiful and exotic-looking girl she remembered from Monaco as Cristiano’s PA, and whom she had seen coming and going from the hospital, was standing in the doorway. Her slanting, cat-like eyes flickered over Kate before going back to Cristiano.

‘Silvio is about to make his speech.’

‘Va bene,’ he said tersely. ‘I’ll be there in a minute.’

The girl stared at him for a second, as if she wanted to say more, but then she turned and disappeared with a disdainful flick of her black shiny hair. The noise from the crowded room was shut off suddenly as the door closed behind her.

Kate was trembling violently with shock in the aftermath of that kiss, and with a sort of wild, excited anticipation, unable to take in the fact that the moment she’d waited for all these years was finally here.

He was here.

Her gaze travelled wonderingly over him, as if trying to make her dazzled mind believe what she was seeing. She had only ever seen him in racing overalls or jeans and a T-shirt before, but the black, perfectly tailored dinner jacket added a whole new dimension of sexiness to his racing driver’s physique, making his shoulders look wider and stronger, his hips narrower. Or maybe they were narrower, she thought with a wrench of desire and compassion. He had lost weight since the accident. The realisation made her want to wrap her arms around him and…

Slowly he turned back to face her. There was a curious stillness about him. In the golden light of the chandeliers his face looked unusually pale.

‘Mi dispiace. I shouldn’t have done that.’

His voice was toneless. Kate felt a pinprick of icy fear at the base of her spine. She shook her head, twisting her hands together to stop herself from reaching out to him.

‘It’s OK.’

He smiled—a chilling echo of the lazy, sexy, delicious smile she remembered so well.

‘Not really. I’m afraid I mistook you for someone else. I apologise…’

The fear blossomed and spread through her, as if it was being injected into her veins. She felt her own smile freeze on her face—a rictus grin of horror. Her whole body suddenly seemed to be made of stone, and it was all she could do to turn her face away so he wouldn’t see the desolation and utter humiliation there.

‘Kate. It’s Kate.’

Her voice was a cracked whisper. She had to leave. Now. Before everything she had ever imagined in her worst-case scenario paled into insignificance.

He nodded curtly, taking a step backwards in the direction of the doors, giving her the benefit of his heartbreaking, ironic half-smile. ‘Kate. Forgive me for my…impulsiveness. It was a pleasure to meet you.’

It felt as if she’d been punched hard in the stomach. She wanted to double up and gasp for air. It had been a mistake. She’d thought he’d recognised her. Remembered her. But it had been…a mistake.

He turned, his shoulders very rigid as he walked away. In a second he would open the door and go back into the crowded room and she would be alone. The moment would have passed.

‘We—we’ve…met before, actually. I’m from Clearspring Water. I interviewed you…once.’

Oh, God. She sounded desperate. Unbalanced. Like some disturbed, obsessed fan. She wouldn’t blame him if he alerted Security now. So to save herself the humiliation of being escorted off the premises, she gathered up her skirt and backed off a couple of steps.