Scandals Of The Rich: A Façade to Shatter
Zach gripped the sides of the podium, his knuckles white. The flash went off again and again and she didn’t miss the way he flinched in reaction. It was so subtle as to seem a natural tic, but something told Lia it was not. Then he seemed to stumble over his thoughts, repeating something he’d just said. Panic rose up in Lia’s chest, gripped her by the throat.
She couldn’t watch him lose his way like he had in Palermo. She couldn’t let him suffer that kind of public meltdown. She didn’t know that he would, but she couldn’t get past the memory of the way she’d met him, plastered against that wall with his eyes tight shut and the flashing and booming of lights and bass all around.
She didn’t have to look at this crowd any longer to know it would be disastrous if he did.
Right now, everyone seemed to be paying attention to Zach. She didn’t quite know what to do, or how to deflect their attention—and then she did. She coughed. Loudly. After a moment, Zach’s gaze slid in her direction. She kept coughing, and then she reached for the water, took a swallow as if she were having trouble. Zach’s attention was firmly on her now. He darted his eyes over the crowd, but they inevitably came back to her.
She coughed again, sipped more water. The photographer seemed satisfied enough with his photos thus far that he lowered his camera and melted toward the back of the crowd.
Lia stopped coughing. A few minutes later, Zach wound up his speech. The room erupted in applause. Lia breathed deeply, relieved. Though, perhaps Zach had been in control the whole time. Perhaps he’d never needed her intervention, lame though it was.
She watched him walk toward her. People stopped him, talked to him, making his progress back to her side take quite a long time. But then he was there, and she was gazing up at him, searching his face for signs of stress.
There were none.
He gazed over her head, his attention caught by something. Just for a moment, his mouth tightened. The flash went off again and Lia whirled toward the source.
“Come, darling,” Zach said, holding out his hand. “Let’s get you home.”
Several of the Washington elite slid sideways glances at them, but Lia didn’t care. She gave Zach a big smile and put her hand in his. He helped her from her chair and then they were moving toward the exit. They were waylaid a few more times, but soon they were on the street and Lia sucked in a relieved breath. They were facing the National Mall and the street was far quieter here since it fronted the museums instead of busy Constitution Avenue.
Raoul pulled up in the Mercedes on cue. Zach didn’t wait for him to come around and open the door. He yanked it open and motioned Lia inside. Then he joined her and they were speeding off into the night. Zach leaned back against the seat and closed his eyes. His palms were steepled together in his lap.
She found herself wanting to trace a finger along the hard line of his jaw. She would not do it, of course.
“Are you all right?” she asked presently.
His eyes opened. “Fine. Why?”
She fiddled with the beading on her gown. “I thought the photographer might have disturbed you.”
Zach was very still. “Not at all,” he said after a moment’s hesitation. “It goes with the territory. I am accustomed to it.”
His answer disappointed her, but she decided not to push him further. She remembered how angry he’d been in Palermo, how disgusted with himself. She’d hoped he might confide in her tonight, but she had to understand why he did not.
Still, she ached for him.
“I’m sorry those things happened to you,” she said. “In the war.”
He shrugged. “That’s what war is, Lia. Brutal, inhumane. People get hurt and people die. I’m one of the lucky ones.”
Lucky ones. He didn’t sound as if he believed those words at all. And yet he was lucky. He was here, alive—and she was suddenly very thankful for that. Her chest squeezed tight as she thought of what he’d said tonight—and how very close she’d come to never knowing him at all.
“Why don’t you fly anymore, Zach?” She remembered that he’d said he couldn’t but she didn’t know why. She’d asked him that night in Palermo, but then she’d told him not to answer when she’d thought she’d crossed a line into something too personal.
Now, however, she wanted to know. She felt like she needed to know in order to understand him better. Her heart beat harder as she waited.
He sighed. And then he tapped his temple. “Head trauma. Unpredictable headaches accompanied by vision loss. Definitely not a good idea when flying a fighter jet at thirty thousand feet.”
He sounded so nonchalant about it, but she knew how much it must hurt him. “I’m sorry.”
His eyes gleamed as he looked at her. “Me, too. I loved flying.”
“I don’t like to fly,” she said. “I find it scary.”
He grinned, and it warmed her. “That’s because you don’t understand how it works. By that, I mean the noises the plane makes, the process of flight—not to mention the fact you aren’t in control. It’s some unseen person up there, holding your life in his or her hands. But it’s all very basic, I assure you.”
“I know it’s mostly safe,” she said. “But you’re right. I haven’t flown much, and the sounds and bumps and lack of control scare me.”
She’d longed for a sedative on the long flight from Sicily, but she hadn’t dared take one because of the baby.
His laugh made a little tendril of flame lick through her. “A fighter jet is so much more intense. The engines scream, the thrust is incredible and the only thing keeping you from blacking out is the G suit.”
Lia blinked. “What is a G suit?”
“An antigravity suit,” he said. “It has sensors that tell it when to inflate. It fits tight around the abdomen and legs in order to prevent the blood draining from the brain during quick acceleration.”
Lia shivered. “That sounds frightening.”
He shrugged. “Blacking out would be frightening. The suit not so much. You get used to it.”
“You miss flying, don’t you?”
He nodded. “Every damn day.”
“Then I’m sorry you can’t do it anymore.”
“Me, too.” He put his head back on the seat and closed his eyes. She wanted to reach out and touch him, wanted to run her fingers along his jaw and into his hair. But she didn’t.
She couldn’t breach that barrier, no matter how much she wanted to. She didn’t know what she really meant by such a gesture, what she expected. And she couldn’t bear it if he turned away from her. If he rejected her.
Lia clasped her hands in her lap and turned to look at the White House as they glided by on Constitution Avenue, heading toward the Lincoln Memorial and the bridge across the Potomac. The monuments were brightly lit, glowing white in the night. Traffic wasn’t heavy and they moved swiftly past the sites, across the bridge and toward Zach’s house in Virginia.
Lia racked her brain for something to say, something basic and innocuous. No matter what he’d said about the photographer, she was certain he’d had trouble with the intrusiveness of the flash.
But she didn’t feel she could push the subject. He’d already shared something with her when he’d told her why he could no longer fly, and how much he missed it. He had not said those things during his speech. He’d said them to her, privately, and she knew it bothered him a great deal.
She was still trying to think of something to say when Zach’s phone rang. He opened his eyes and drew it from his pocket, answering only once he’d looked at the display. He spent the next fifteen minutes discussing his schedule with someone, and then the car was sliding between the gates and pulling up in front of the house.
Zach helped her out of the car and they passed inside as a uniformed maid opened the door. It was dark and quiet inside. The maid disappeared once Zach told her they needed nothing else this evening.
The grand staircase loomed before them, subtly lit with wall sconces that went up to the landing. Zach took Lia’s elbow and guided her up the stairs. His touch was like a brand, sizzling into her, and her breath shortened as all her attention seemed to focus on that one spot. She didn’t want to feel this heat, this curl of excitement and fear that rolled in her belly, but she couldn’t seem to help it.
The way he’d touched her earlier, kissed her—
Lia swallowed. She shouldn’t want him to do it again, and yet a part of her did. A lonely, traitorous part of her. She wanted him to need her, wanted him to share his loneliness with her.
He escorted her to the room she’d been shown to earlier. But he didn’t push her against the wall the way he had in the museum. His hand fell away from her elbow and he took a step back.
Disappointment swirled in her belly, left her feeling hot and achy and empty. After that blazing kiss in the art museum, she’d expected something far different. And after his speech tonight, she’d wanted something far different. That was the Zach she wanted to know—the one who hid his feelings beneath a veneer of coldness, who’d watched six marines die and who would never fly again, though he loved it.
That was the Zach he buried deep, the one he’d let out in Palermo. The one she wanted again.
“You did well tonight,” he said. Still so cool, so indifferent.
Lia dropped her gaze as another emotion flared to life inside her. Confusion. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe he was just very good at being what the situation required. War hero. Senator’s son. Fiery lover. “Thank you.”
“Good night, Lia.” He leaned forward and kissed her cheek. The touch was light, almost imperceptible. His hands were in his pockets.
She blinked up at him. “Good night, Zach.”
He didn’t make a move to leave so she opened her door and went inside her room because she thought that was what he wanted her to do. Then she turned and pressed her ear against the door, straining to hear him as he walked away. Her heart pounded in her chest.
What if he didn’t go? What if he knocked on her door instead? What if she opened it and he took her in his arms and said he needed her?
What would she do?
Maybe she should open the door. Just yank it open and confront him. Ask him why he’d kissed her like that earlier. Why he’d mentioned altering the arrangement and then acted like it never happened.
Her fingers tightened on the knob. She would do it. She would jerk it open. She would demand an answer and she wouldn’t fear rejection—
Footsteps moved away down the hall. A door opened and closed.
Lia wanted to cry out in frustration. She’d waited too long.
The moment was gone.
CHAPTER EIGHT
IT WAS STILL DARK when Lia woke. She lay in bed, uncertain for the first few moments where she was. And then she remembered. She was in Zach’s house, in a guest room. She reached for her phone to check the time—2:00 a.m.
Lia yawned and pressed the button to open her mail. Four new messages popped into her inbox, but only one caught her attention.
From: Rosa Corretti
To: Lia Corretti
Subject: Hi
Lia’s pulse thrummed as she clicked on the message. She read through it quickly, and then went back to the beginning to make sure she’d read it right the first time. Rosa was actually writing to her. There wasn’t a snarky word or single insult in the entire missive. In fact, there was a word Lia had never expected to see: Sorry.
Rosa was sorry for snapping at her after Carmela’s outburst. Not only that, but her half sister said she’d been thinking about many things and that she realized how rotten it must have been for Lia to live with Teresa and Salvatore once her father remarried and had a new family.
Rosa wouldn’t know that Lia had actually been sent away long before Benito remarried. Why would she? Until just now, Lia was pretty sure Rosa barely remembered her existence, much less thought about her in any capacity.
Still, it was nice to hear from her. Surprising, but nice.
Lia would answer her, most definitely, but she wasn’t about to get her hopes up for what their relationship could be. She’d spent her entire life mostly forgotten, and she wasn’t planning to stick her neck out now. She didn’t really know Rosa, but she knew what kind of woman Carmela was. Hopefully her daughter was nothing like her, but Lia intended to proceed with caution.
She got out of bed and slipped on her robe. Even thinking about Carmela had the power to make her feel badly about herself. When she remembered the way Zach had left her at her door tonight, the feeling intensified. It had taken her some time, but she’d figured out what he’d been doing at the museum when he’d kissed her.
He’d been getting her under control after she’d broken out of the box he’d put her in for the night. She’d dared to show temper, and he’d managed to smooth it over and make her forget for a while. He’d tugged her into the corner he wanted her in and tied her up neatly with a bow.
She’d sat there like a good girl, smiling and applauding and worrying over him. It infuriated her to remember how compliant she’d been, and all because he’d pressed her against that wall and made her remember what it had been like between them.
Heat crawled up her spine, settled between her legs and in her core. In spite of it all, her body still wanted his. It angered her to be so out of control of her own reactions, to feel so needy around a man who clearly didn’t need her.
Lia went to the French doors and pulled them open, hoping the night air would help to cool her down.
A mistake, because it was summer in Virginia and the night air wasn’t precisely cool. Oh, it was far cooler than it had been in the heat of the day, but it was still quite warm.
There was a breeze, however. Lia stepped outside and walked barefooted across the stone terrace to the railing. The strong scent of lavender rose from the pots set along the wall. She ran her fingers over the blooms, brought them to her nose. It made her think of home.
If she could add lemon to the mix, she’d be transported to Sicily. Except that Sicily didn’t quite feel like home any longer, she had to admit. Since the moment she’d fallen into Zach’s arms at the wedding, she’d felt a restlessness that hadn’t gone away. Sicily had seemed too small to contain her, too lonely.
But coming to the States was no better. She was still alone.
She could hear the river gurgling over boulders in the distance. The moon was full, its pale light picking out trees and grass and the foaming water where it rolled over rocks.
It was peaceful. Quiet, other than the river and the sound of a distant—very distant—dog barking. She leaned against the railing and tried to empty her mind of everything but sleep.
It was difficult, considering her body was on another time zone. Not only that, but she also had a lot on her mind. She’d fled Sicily because she’d been scared of what her family would do, but she’d never considered what Zach would do. Or what her life would become once she was with him.
Was it only yesterday that she’d stood in a hotel and told him their arrangement would be in name only? And now here she was, aching for his touch, and simply because he’d kissed her tonight with enough heat to incinerate her will.
She was weak and she despised herself for it. She didn’t fit in, not anywhere, and she wanted to. Zach had held out the promise of belonging on that night in Palermo—and she’d leaped on it, not realizing it had been a Pandora’s box of endless heartache and trouble.
There was a noise and a crash from somewhere behind her. Lia jumped and spun around to see where it had come from. It seemed to be from farther down the terrace, from another room. Her heart was in her throat as she stood frozen, undecided whether to run into her room and close the door or go see what had happened. What if it were Zach? What if he needed her?
But then a door burst open and a man rushed through and Lia gasped. He was naked, except for a pair of dark boxer shorts. He went over to the railing and leaned on it, gulping in air. He dropped his head in his hands. His skin glistened in the night, as if he’d just gotten out of a sauna.
The moonlight illuminated the shiny round scar tissue of the bullet wound in the man’s side. Zach.
As if it could be anyone else. Her heart went out to him.
“Is everything okay?” she asked softly.
He spun toward her, his body alert with tension. Briefly, she wondered if she should run. And then she shook herself. No, she would not run.
Zach wasn’t dangerous, no matter that he’d told her he was in Palermo.
“You’re okay, Zach,” she said, moving cautiously, uncertain if he was still caught in the grips of a dream or an episode like the one in Palermo. “It’s me. It’s Lia.”
He scraped a hand through his hair. “I know who it is,” he said, his voice hoarse in the night. The tension in him seemed to subside, though she knew it was still right beneath the surface. “What are you doing outside in the middle of the night?” he demanded.
She ignored his tone. “I could ask the same of you.”
He turned toward the railing again, leaned on it. It was such a subtle maneuver, but it warmed her because it meant, on some level, at least, that he trusted her. After what he’d been through in the war, she didn’t take that lightly.
“I had a dream,” he said. The words were clipped and tired.
Lia stepped closer, until she could have touched him if she reached out. She didn’t reach out. “And it was not a good one,” she said softly.
He shook his head. Once. Curtly. “No.”
“Do you often dream of the war?”
He swung to look at her. “Who said I was dreaming of the war?”
She thought of the wild look in his eyes when he’d first looked at her, at the way he’d seemed to be somewhere else instead of here, and knew she was right. Just like that night in Palermo, though he had been wide awake then.
“Is it the same as what happened when I first met you? Or different?”
He didn’t say anything at first. He simply stared at her. The moonlight limned his body, delineating the hard planes and shadows of muscle. She had an overwhelming urge to touch him, but she clenched her hands tightly at her sides instead.
She would not reach for him and have him push her away. She’d done that too many times in her life, when she’d reached out to family and been shunned instead.
“You don’t quit, do you?” he asked.
“You can deny it if you like,” she said. “But I think we both know the truth.”
“Fine.” He blew out a breath. “It’s different than Palermo. When I dream, it’s much worse.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
He laughed suddenly. A broken, rusty sound. “God, no. And you don’t want to hear it, Lia. You’d run screaming back to Sicily if you did. But thanks for trying.”
Lia bristled at his presumption. “I’m tougher than I look.”
He shook his head. “You only think you are. Forget it, kitten.”
Kitten. She didn’t know whether to be insulted or warmed by that endearment. “The photographer did bother you.”
“Yes.”
There was a warning in his tone. But she couldn’t leave it, not now.
“Why do you do these things if you’re worried about your reaction?”
He growled. “Because I have no choice, Lia. I’m a Scott, and Scotts do their duty. And you’d better get used to it because soon you’ll be one of us.”
It suddenly made her angry. Why should people do things that hurt them just to please other people? “So you’re saying I must put myself in situations that cause me stress for the sake of the Scotts?”
His eyes flashed. “Something like that.”
She lifted her chin. “And if I refuse?”
“Too late to back out now, babe. I told Elizabeth Cunningham you were my fiancée. Tomorrow, the papers will be filled with you and me. The whole city will be interested in the woman who captured my heart. And you will be at my side for every damn event I have to attend. Like it or not.”
A tremor slid through her. “You’re no different than my grandfather was,” she said bitterly. “It’s all about appearances. The family. What will people think? What will they do if they know we’re human, too?” Lia cursed in Italian. “We can’t have that, can we? Because the family reputation is everything.”
So long as you didn’t shame the family, so long as you kept your mouth shut and your head down, you could stay. But, oh, don’t expect them to care about you.
Don’t ever expect that. She put her hand over her belly and vowed with everything in her that her child would never for one minute think public façades were more important than feelings. It was untenable, no matter the importance of the family.
She started to turn away, but Zach gripped her arms. She tried to pull out of his hold, but he wouldn’t let her go. His face was so close to hers. And, in spite of her fury, her body was softening, aching. She hated that he did that to her. Especially when she did no such thing to him in return.
“Some things are bigger than our own desires,” he said. “You know that.”
Lia sucked in a breath that shook with tears. “And some things are more important than appearances.” She thought of him at the podium, of the way he’d looked when he’d started to fight the demons in his head, and then of the way he’d rushed out onto the terrace tonight, and she couldn’t stand that he would have to face the same issue again and again, and all for the sake of his family reputation. “Maybe you should talk to someone—”
He let her go and shoved back, away from her. Then he swore. Explosively.
A second later he was back, one long finger inches from her nose. It trembled as he pointed. If not for that single detail, she would have been frightened of his temper.
“Leave it, Lia. It’s none of your business,” he growled. The finger dropped and he spun away, put both hands on the railing and stood there, drawing in breath after breath after breath.
She didn’t know quite what to say. She hadn’t thought her suggestion would cause him such pain, but clearly it had. She hated that it did. And she hated that he wouldn’t share with her. That he lost his cool, but wouldn’t tell her what she so desperately wanted to know to help him.
She closed her eyes and swallowed, and then closed the distance between them until she was beside him. He didn’t move or speak, and neither did she.
“I’ll do my duty, Zach,” she said softly. “I’ll be at every event you are. And I won’t let them get to you.”
No matter what she’d said about refusing to go along, she wouldn’t leave him to face those situations alone. Not after tonight. He needed someone with him, and she would be that someone.
He turned toward her, his brows drawn down in a question.
She lifted her chin and tumbled onward. She felt silly, but it was too late to turn back.
“The photographers. The flashes. The crowds. Whatever it is, I won’t let them derail you or trigger a reaction. You can count on me.”
His expression didn’t change, but his nostrils flared. “You’re offering to protect me?”
Oh, it did sound so ridiculous when he put it like that. On impulse, she reached for his bare arm, squeezed the hard muscle encouragingly while trying to ignore the heat sizzling into her.
“Whatever it takes,” she said. And then, because her cheeks were hot with embarrassment and she didn’t want to hear what he might say in response, she turned and walked away.
“Lia.”
She was to her door when he called out. She turned to face him, her hands at her sides, trying for all the world to seem casual and calm. “Yes?”
“Grazie, cara mia.”
Her heart skipped. “You’re welcome,” she said. And then she stepped into her room and closed the door with a quiet, lonely click.
The day did not promise to be a good one. Zach turned up the speed on the treadmill, forcing himself to run faster. He needed to reach that Zen moment of almost total exhaustion before he could consider himself in any shape to deal with everything coming his way today.