Fascination: The Sicilian's Ruthless Marriage Revenge

‘Drink?’ He held up the bottle of champagne he had ready and chilling in a silver ice bucket.

It was later than seven-thirty, of course. But he had expected that. He’d known that Robin would deliberately be later than the time he had specified, if not as late as she had said she would be, in an attempt to show him that she would not fall in with his plans.

Not yet, anyway.

‘Champagne, Cesare?’ she came back teasingly. ‘Isn’t your … celebration a little premature?’

‘Is it?’ he mused unconcernedly, and he poured some of the pink bubbling liquid into a glass for Robin before filling his own and carrying them both over to where she stood. ‘I make a point of always drinking champagne, Robin,’ he explained as he handed her one of the flutes.

She returned his gaze unflinchingly. ‘How wonderful to be so privileged!’

Cesare smiled lazily down at her. ‘Not at all. I have found it is the only alcohol that does not result in a hangover!’

He was so damned sure of himself, wasn’t he? Robin fumed, as she sipped the pink bubbly wine. So confident that he had the upper hand in their dealings with each other.

And didn’t he?

It hadn’t been easy introducing the subject of Cesare Gambrelli with her father when Charles had returned home earlier this evening. In fact, it had proved almost impossible. Charles had merely repeated his warning for her to stay away from him when she had mentioned Cesare’s name. A comment he wouldn’t enlarge on, despite her urgings.

Although it really wasn’t too difficult, after the conversation she’d had with Cesare herself that afternoon, to realise why her father was wary of their family’s tenuous connection to this man. The one concession her father had made to his near-silence on the subject of Cesare Gambrelli was to state that the other man was completely ruthless in his business dealings.

But just how much more ruthless would he be towards the family he held responsible for his sister’s death?

But, without alerting her father to the fact that Cesare Gambrelli had paid her a personal visit that very afternoon, she hadn’t been able to press him for any more information.

Neither had she told him that Cesare was the ‘friend’ she’d said she was meeting for dinner this evening; that would have certainly sparked off a conversation she wasn’t yet ready for. Besides, her father had looked so tired after yet another meeting to discuss Simon’s gambling debts …

‘What shall we drink to, Robin?’ Cesare drawled derisively. ‘A successful conclusion to our earlier conversation, perhaps?’ he added, with a mocking smile at her obvious resentment at being there at all.

Her eyes glittered deeply purple as she looked up at him from between thick, dark lashes. ‘That would only result in your making the toast!’

Cesare gave an appreciative grin. ‘I have a feeling that we will be doing a lot of things in conflict for some time to come, Robin. But we may as well begin now, do you not think? Drink up,’ he added impatiently as her fingers merely tightened about the slender stem of the glass.

Instead of doing as he requested she chose to walk away from him, moving across the room to stand beside the door.

As if poised for flight, Cesare easily guessed. Well, what was the saying? She could run but she couldn’t hide. Robin could try running from him all she wanted, but his mind was completely made up: this woman would become his wife.

His eyes moved slowly down her body. He knew she had probably chosen to wear that black sheath of a dress as a means of detracting from the graceful lines of her body. As she had also chosen to smooth back and confine the wild beauty of her honey-gold hair.

Unfortunately for Robin it had the opposite effect; there was something extremely tantalising in the wearing of a dress that hinted at her curves rather than displayed them, and the taming of her hair merely made him want to release those glorious honey-gold tresses and kiss her until she became totally pliant in his arms.

She would probably be most displeased to learn that her efforts at killing any desire he might feel for her body had only succeeded in increasing his need; he had to know, to caress and kiss every velvety-soft inch of her!

Robin wished Cesare would stop looking at her in that way. She was feeling completely physically vulnerable under the intensity of his dark, narrowed scrutiny—as if he had stripped every article of clothing from her body. And there wasn’t much; she was only wearing black panties and silk stockings beneath the dress.

She shifted uncomfortably, aware that her body was responding to his caressing assessment in spite of herself. Her nipples were hard and sensitised beneath the soft material of her dress, and there was a spreading warmth between her thighs.

It was totally incomprehensible to her why she reacted to this man in the way she did. Goodness knew, she had earned that ‘unattainable’ label these last twelve months, and yet every time she was near Cesare Gambrelli her body responded as if it already knew his—as if they were already lovers!

‘I have ordered dinner to be served at eight-thirty,’ he told her lightly, continuing to sip his own champagne even as he continued to look at her with that dark, penetrating gaze.

He could order dinner for whenever he liked—Robin wasn’t in the least sure she would be able to eat anything. Just being with this man was totally robbing her of her appetite.

‘Fine,’ she dismissed tautly, although what they were supposed to do for the next forty-five minutes was questionable!

Surely Cesare didn’t expect them to spend all the time before dinner with his baby nephew?

‘You seem a little … tense this evening, Robin,’ he observed.

Tense? She was so taut with anxiety about this whole evening that her body ached, and her fingers gripped so tightly about the champagne glass that she was in danger of snapping its thin stem!

‘After the way you threatened me earlier, how do you expect me to feel, Cesare?’ she retorted.

His mouth thinned. Of course he had threatened this woman earlier—she was the sister of the man whose memory he held in the highest contempt, the man responsible for Carla’s death!

He arched dark brows. ‘Perhaps you would like me to give you another demonstration of how much you will … enjoy being married to me?’ he invited smoothly, instantly rewarded by the look of alarm in her violet-coloured eyes.

‘I haven’t agreed to marry you yet,’ she reminded him waspishly. ‘So any sort of demonstration on your part is totally unnecessary!’

Cesare was lingeringly aware of the rapidly beating pulse at the base of her throat, of the soft rise and fall of her pert breasts, of the way her dress hinted at the enticing warmth of her shapely thighs.

‘It may be unnecessary, Robin,’ he acknowledged as he took a step towards her, ‘but I, for one, find it inevitable.’

He took the champagne flute from her unresisting fingers to place it on the coffee table with his own, before turning back to draw her into his arms as his head lowered and his mouth easily captured hers.

The curves of her body fitted so perfectly against his. Her breasts crushed against the hardness of his chest, the softness of her thighs pressed hard against his arousal, and her hair fell in silky waves about her face as he reached up and released it from its confinement.

Her mouth tasted of champagne and honey. Her lips were soft and responsive. So very responsive!

This had to stop, Robin told herself achingly.

Had to!

But for the moment she had no will to bring an end to Cesare’s assault on her mouth. His tongue was moving in a sensuous caress against her bottom lip as he quested for entry—an intimacy she couldn’t deny him as her lips parted and his tongue plunged into the waiting heat of her mouth.

Dear God, she wanted this man! she acknowledged, as her fingers became fiercely entangled in the dark thickness of his hair.

She wanted Cesare as she had never wanted any man before—not even Giles, the man she had been married to for three years. The man who had cast her aside when she no longer suited his plans for the future—

She wrenched her mouth from Cesare’s. ‘No!’ she protested, even as she pushed against him. ‘I don’t want this.’ She breathed raggedly, glaring up at him as his arms remained like steel bands about the slenderness of her waist, moulding her body to the hardness of his.

‘No?’ he taunted knowingly, eyes dark, a nerve pulsing in the rigidness of his jaw.

‘No,’ she repeated firmly.

Cesare noted the slight trembling of her bottom lip, knowing that she lied—that at that moment she wanted him very much.

As he wanted her.

But she was right. This was not the time. Perhaps later, once Marco was asleep.

He released her abruptly to step back. ‘It is time that you met Marco,’ he told her haughtily.

‘Now?’ she breathed shakily, her fingers arresting in the movement of smoothing back her hair as she stared up at him with a haunted expression.

Cesare’s mouth tightened at her obvious reluctance. ‘Yes—now,’ he grated. ‘I will go through to the nursery and get him—’

‘Oh … couldn’t I just come through with you and say goodnight to him there?’ she suggested. ‘It seems a pity to disturb him if he’s already tucked in,’ she added lamely.

‘He is not in his cot yet,’ he assured her firmly. ‘And even if he were, I am sure, like all children, he would welcome this break in his routine.’

No escape there, then, Robin acknowledged with a grimace, her emotions too battered by Cesare’s kisses for her to even attempt to hide the fact that meeting his baby nephew was an ordeal she would rather have forgone.

‘I will only be a moment,’ Cesare assured her distantly, before turning to stride from the room.

Robin picked up her glass of champagne before moving back to stand in front of the window, seeing nothing of the magnificent view outside as she took several nerve-bolstering sips of the wine.

What would he be like, this young nephew of Cesare’s? If he looked anything like his uncle then she had no doubt that he would be a handsome baby—

He looked exactly like his uncle! Robin acknowledged achingly, having turned sharply to look at Cesare as she heard him come back into the sitting room, the little boy held securely in his arms.

Marco’s hair was as dark as Cesare’s, with the same silky curl, and his eyes were that same dark chocolate brown. His beautiful face creased into an excited smile as he looked across the room and spied her standing in front of the window, revealing two endearing little white teeth in his bottom gum.

He looked very tall for six months, his long legs and body encased in a cartoon-patterned babygro, his little hands resting trustingly on his uncle’s chest.

Robin felt her insides melt just looking at him.

‘Let’s go and say hello to Robin, Marco,’ Cesare murmured encouragingly, and he walked across the room towards her with the baby still held firmly.

Robin took an involuntary step backwards, her back instantly coming into contact with the window behind her, its slight chill sending a shiver down her spine.

Cesare’s mouth tightened as he saw Robin back away from him as they approached, the way in which she quivered with distaste even as her eyes remained riveted on Marco.

What was wrong with this woman? Apart from caring for Carla when she was a baby, Cesare had had little contact with babies himself, but he had fallen in love with Marco from the moment he was born. He could not believe it possible for anyone not to do the same once they had seen the tiny boy.

But Robin no longer looked as if she just wanted to run, but as if the devil himself were chasing at her heels!

Cesare’s mouth hardened. ‘He does not bite, Robin,’ he said pointedly.

‘No?’ she came back tautly. ‘Those teeth say otherwise.’ She attempted a lightness she was obviously far from feeling.

Cesare looked at her searchingly, noting the way she held herself away from them, as if she were afraid even to touch Marco.

But Marco obviously had other ideas, gurgling happily as he reached out his small arms towards Robin.

‘Cats do the same thing, I believe,’ Cesare observed, as Robin seemed to shrink even further into herself.

‘What …?’ she breathed shakily, with barely a glance at him as she continued to stare at Marco as if hypnotised.

Cesare shrugged his shoulders as he maintained his hold on the now squirming Marco. ‘They have an unerring instinct to go to people who show a dislike for them!’ he explained sharply, and his young nephew launched himself at Robin in the total belief that she would catch him.

Something she did most reluctantly, holding the baby slightly away from her as Marco made a grab for the long honey-coloured hair that Cesare had so recently released from its confinement.

Cesare’s gaze was deliberately unreadable as he looked down at the two of them.

Carla had been a natural mother, totally at ease with her baby son from the moment he was born. But Robin looked as if she was holding a time bomb in her arms—one that was set to explode at any moment.

Marco knew no such inhibitions, grinning at Robin unconcernedly as he twisted a long length of her hair into his baby fist and talked to her in the gibberish that only he could understand.

Cesare frowned darkly and held himself ready to take his nephew from her if it became necessary. If—as she looked in danger of doing!—Robin collapsed completely.

Unless this was just a ploy on her part to try and shake Cesare’s resolve to marry her in order to settle the blood feud between their two families?

He had made no secret of the deep love he had for Marco, and Robin was intelligent enough to know that he would have no desire to present the baby with a mother who didn’t even want to hold him, let alone laugh and play with him.

Was Robin using his love for Marco against him?

If she was, then she was in for a disappointment!

‘I will take Marco back to bed now,’ Cesare told her coldly.

Robin turned to give him a startled look, having briefly forgotten Cesare was even in the room, all of her attention focused on the baby she held in her arms.

‘He seems quite happy where he is,’ she pointed out ruefully, and Marco turned to grin at his uncle as his fingers tightened in her hair.

‘Nevertheless, it is past his bedtime,’ Cesare informed her reprovingly. He reached out to take the resisting baby from her, Marco’s happy gurgles instantly turning to cries of protest.

Robin reached up to untangle the tiny fingers from her hair. No easy feat when Marco seemed determined not to let go.

‘Perhaps I had better come to the nursery with you …?’ she offered huskily as Marco continued to grip.

‘Perhaps you had,’ Cesare allowed wryly, resisting his nephew’s efforts to return to Robin’s arms as he strode off towards the nursery. Robin had no choice but to hurry after him if she didn’t want her hair pulled out by the roots.

Marco grinned at her over his uncle’s shoulder, still hanging on to her hair, and Robin returned that grin now that she was no longer under Cesare’s close scrutiny.

Because Cesare had been wrong earlier today when he had claimed her marriage to Giles had ended because she’d avoided getting pregnant.

She hadn’t avoided it at all.

She hadn’t been able—wasn’t able—to give Giles the children he wanted to carry on the Bennett name.

Robin hadn’t been too worried when she didn’t conceive during the first year of her marriage—had just assumed that it would happen when it happened. But as the months passed with no sign of a baby, Robin had decided she ought to visit a medical specialist.

The first of many such visits.

There had followed two years of tests. The keeping of charts. Followed by more tests.

But no baby.

The tests had shown that there was nothing wrong with either Robin or Giles’s fertility—that Robin simply hadn’t conceived. Her specialist had advised that perhaps they should think of adoption, that sometimes in cases like theirs, where no reason could be found for the lack of conception, with the pressure taken off the mother became pregnant quite naturally. Giles had refused to even consider adoption, had wanted a child of his own blood or not at all.

That child—a son—had been born to Giles and his second wife only two months ago.

Leaving Robin with the certainty that she had to have been the one at fault.

The end of her marriage meant that she would never have a child now, that she was doomed to a marriageless and a childless future. For how could she marry any man and expect him to accept that she could never give him a baby?

Except that Cesare Gambrelli, although he didn’t know it, was now offering to marry her and give her the child she couldn’t have herself.

A baby she had fallen in love with on sight!

CHAPTER FIVE

‘COULD I pOSSIBLY . . . freshen up before dinner?’

Cesare turned at Robin’s halting request, which intruded on his dark and brooding thoughts as the two of them left Marco’s nursery together a few minutes later.

He had thought he would catch her off guard by presenting Marco in that way, and yet Cesare knew that he was the one who felt unsettled by the encounter.

It really was totally inexplicable to him why Marco had taken such a liking to Robin; she had certainly done nothing to encourage him.

The baby had screamed when Cesare had returned him to his cot, his little arms reaching up imploringly to Robin. But Robin had remained completely detached as Cesare laid the baby down, before tucking him beneath the covers with his favourite teddy bear at his side.

Robin’s aloofness towards Cesare he could understand and excuse, but her coldness towards Marco he could not accept. The baby had already lost his mother—even if he wasn’t really old enough to have realised it—and Cesare had no intention of allowing Robin to maintain that ridiculously cool attitude towards him just because she wasn’t in control here.

Because, no matter how she might wish it otherwise, he still had every intention of making Robin his wife. And sooner rather than later!

‘Use the bathroom there.’ He gestured dismissively and he continued to stride towards the sitting room, definitely feeling in need of more champagne.

‘Thank you,’ Robin accepted quietly, before escaping into the bathroom.

When she looked at her reflection in the mirror over the sink, she could see her eyes were overbright.

She was in love!

Not with Cesare Gambrelli.

Nor with any other man.

But with a six-month-old baby who had captured her heart at first sight!

She sat down weakly on the side of the bath, breathing deeply in an effort to calm her racing pulse.

Marco was adorable—absolutely adorable. And it had felt so good when she’d held him in her arms, so achingly right; he was the baby she had dreamt of having for so long—so much so that she had been reluctant to relinquish him to Cesare when the time had come.

What did she do now …?

Cesare Gambrelli had told her he intended marrying her. That he intended for her to be Marco’s mother.

How she wanted the latter, if not the former.

But the price was being Cesare’s scorned and despised wife—a woman he had only married to settle what he called a blood feud. Did she want that?

Yes!

Cesare didn’t know it, but he was offering her something she had thought she would never know—a joy Robin had thought for ever denied her. Now that she had met Marco, held him, felt the warmth of him, been the recipient of his beautiful smile, there was no way she would be able to walk away from the chance to be his mother.

She knew she daren’t let Cesare see how deeply her emotions had been affected, already knowing him well enough to realise that if he thought he was actually giving her something she so desperately wanted, then he would use that advantage to bend her totally to his arrogant will.

Yes, now that she had seen and held Marco she fully intended marrying Cesare—but it would be on her own terms, not his …

‘We may as well go through to dinner,’ Cesare announced when Robin rejoined him in the sitting room, her hair once more in a neat chignon and looking again like the coolly detached woman who had arrived at his apartment less than half an hour ago.

Once Robin was his wife, Cesare had decided as he sipped his champagne and waited for her to rejoin him, he had no intention of giving her any choice but to become Marco’s mother. With time, he hoped she would learn to be at ease with with the child, to love him as he deserved to be loved.

‘Fine,’ she accepted distantly, before preceding him into the dining room that he indicated.

A woman any man would be proud to have on his arm, Cesare knew, as he watched the gentle sway of her hips as she walked in front of him.

Or in his bed.

‘Have you decided what it is you wish to tell your father about our forthcoming marriage?’ Cesare prompted, once he had seen her seated opposite him at the small, intimate table he had requested be laid for their meal together.

Robin eyed him warily. ‘I believe I told you earlier that nothing has been settled yet concerning a marriage between the two of us?’

Cesare gave a hard smile. ‘Fight it all you want, Robin, but the marriage will take place.’

She hadn’t given herself away, Robin realised with relief. And she dared not do so, either, because if Cesare even half guessed at how she had fallen for Marco, then all her bargaining power was spent. And she had little enough to start with!

‘Perhaps,’ she allowed uninterestedly, avoiding the intensity of his stare as she placed her napkin across her lap in preparation for eating the platter of seafood that was the first course. ‘As for how we deal with my father …’ she paused, as if to give the matter some thought ‘… I really don’t think he would accept anything less for me than what he perceives as a love match.’

Cesare’s eyes widened. ‘I know I told you earlier that I would go along with whatever you decided to tell him, but do you seriously expect me to behave in front of your father as if I have fallen in love with you?’

‘Beyond your powers, is it?’ Robin came back tauntingly, stung by his tone of incredulity. ‘Or just totally incomprehensible to you?’ she added softly as she saw his contemptuous expression.

‘You can’t pretend to be in love because you’ve never been in love—is that it?’ she prompted curiously.

‘Love!’ he snorted. ‘My father loved my mother so much that when she died he drank himself to an early death! Carla loved Marco’s father—and he abandoned her totally once he knew she was expecting his child! Contrarily, your own husband did not want you once you had refused to have his child. I do not need to have been in love, Robin, to know it is a destructive emotion!’

Robin had been prepared to give him an argument on the subject—until he mentioned her own marriage. Because she had loved Giles when she’d married him—had thought he loved her too. But that love hadn’t been strong enough to withstand Giles’s disappointment when she hadn’t been able to give him the child he wanted …

And she already knew that falling in love with Cesare Gambrelli would be sheer madness—for any woman!

No, loving Marco, and being this man’s unwilling wife, was as far as she was willing to go.

‘True,’ she acknowledged. ‘Nevertheless, for my father’s sake, I really think if we are to go ahead with this marriage that we will have to behave for a few weeks as if we’re in love with each other.’

Cesare looked at her frustratedly, knowing what she was demanding was her own price for agreeing to marry him without further argument or delay. A high price, granted, and not one that he would normally have even considered. But perhaps the pretence would have benefits to himself that even Robin had not considered yet.