The Innocent's Emergency Wedding

He blinked and that smile fully resurfaced. ‘How do you know I don’t want you?’

She laughed bitterly. ‘You never so much as looked at me.’

‘If I recall, the last time we met you were little more than a child. It would have been unacceptable in every way if I’d looked at you then.’ He angled his head. ‘But I’m looking at you now.’

As if that was going to make any difference!

‘Don’t bother,’ she snapped. ‘You have hundreds of gorgeous women you really want. All of them. At once—’ She broke off, realising she’d got herself into a quagmire of excruciating embarrassment.

‘Hundreds at once?’ he echoed with mild incredulity.

‘Oh, whatever.’ She shook off his amusement. ‘You know you don’t need to threaten a woman to get your way with her. You don’t need to use blackmail—emotional or otherwise.’

‘But that’s what Brian does to you.’ All amusement had dropped from his expression.

She drew in a deep breath and sighed. ‘He’s used to me doing what he says.’

Because she’d always worked to keep the peace, for Susan. But in asking this of her Brian had gone too far. It wasn’t a business deal he’d arranged, it was marriage—intimate and personal. And Brian’s brutal response to her refusal had horrified her. So she’d decided to figure out a deal of her own with the one man Brian despised. The only man she’d been able to think of.

‘But you’re not his daughter,’ Alessandro said.

‘Thank you for that reminder,’ she said stiffly, swallowing back the burn of pain.

It was stupid how much it hurt. There’d always been those little comments from Brian—constantly reminding her that she wasn’t family, that she had to be grateful and good, keep her on her best behaviour… The few times she’d tried to fight back, he’d squashed her.

‘I’m no blood relative to any of them.’

And that was what gave Brian even more power over her.

‘You don’t think of me as family?’ Alessandro asked.

She glanced up at him. ‘You weren’t there. How could you be?’

Alessandro had only appeared from boarding school during holidays and formal occasions. Her aloof ‘step-cousin’ couldn’t have been less interested in forming a relationship with his new family.

‘And thank you for that reminder,’ he echoed with a soft jeer. An arrogant smile curved his lips for a fleeting second. ‘I chose to leave—why can’t you?’

‘I’m not like you,’ she said. ‘I can’t just walk out. I can’t talk to Susan about it—she doesn’t know about any of this.’ Katie was protecting her on several levels. ‘I’d buy out the debt myself, if I could, but I have hardly any money.’

His gaze narrowed. ‘You said your sauces sell well?’

She bristled at his belittling tone. ‘They do okay. They’re even stocked in Sybarite, here in London.’

She’d been so delighted when the gourmet deli had put in a repeat order only a week ago, taking almost all her stock.

‘Sybarite? Wonderful.’ He said with light mockery. ‘Then why aren’t you paid accordingly?’

‘I put all the profit back into the business… I don’t need a lot personally.’

His eyebrows shot up.

‘I live in,’ she explained irritably. ‘I have accommodation and food. I don’t need fancy things.’

He skimmed a glance over her outfit and she shrank at the hint of disdain in his eyes.

But then she fought back. ‘I knew things weren’t good—that’s why I started the garden tours as well. I owe it to them to work hard…to help Susan.’

She’d heard that phrase so many times and Brian was right, she did owe them. They’d plucked her from a life of poverty and neglect… Who knew what her life would have been like if it hadn’t been for their generosity?

‘You don’t owe them the rest of your life,’ Alessandro said bluntly.

‘No, but I love Susan,’ she said fiercely. ‘And she needs me now.’

‘There’s no one else? Not her husband?’ he said dryly.

Katie froze at the disparagement in his tone. ‘All the times I’ve tried to stand up to Brian… In the end I’ve given in…’

‘Because of Susan?’

‘Yes.’

But Alessandro was right, wasn’t he? She didn’t have to sacrifice her whole life.

‘I guess because of her…he has a hold over me,’ she said lamely.

‘And I don’t?’

‘Of course not.’

But she couldn’t meet Alessandro’s eyes. He had a hold over her in a way that she could never admit to herself, let alone to him.

‘So you think that if you marry someone else then you won’t have to marry Carl?’

‘Yes.’

But when he put it as baldly as that it sounded crazy.

‘Why me?’ he asked.

‘Because you’re outrageous enough to actually do it,’ she said bluntly.

No one would expect the infamous playboy to settle, and somehow she thought he might enjoy that unpredictability.

‘And, according to the rich list, you have more money than you know what to do with.’

‘Now, that’s what I originally expected.’ His twisting smile held little mirth. ‘You want me to rescue White Oaks financially? Why not just ask me for the money? Why do we have to marry?’

‘Because it’s a language Brian understands. If I’m not married—without the protection of a man,’ she spat sarcastically, ‘I’ll still be controllable. If I’m married, he’ll back off. I don’t want just to be out of reach. I want to be repulsive.’

‘Repulsive?’ Alessandro echoed awfully. ‘And there’s no better way to do that than by marrying me? Wow.’ He leaned forward. ‘You make it sound so eighteenth-century… Will you be sullied for ever if you’re with me?’

‘Married to you, yes.’

She’d never forgotten the look of anger on Brian’s face when he’d seen an article featuring Alessandro in the newspapers.

‘Brian will hate that I’ve come to you.’

He drew in a sharp breath.

Katie suddenly realised what she’s said and sent him a contrite look. ‘I’m sorry—’

‘Don’t apologise for being honest.’ He watched her for a moment. ‘You’ll do anything to look after Susan?’

‘Almost anything.’ A welter of guilt swamped Katie.

His sympathetic glance was laced with sarcasm. ‘You’d rather sell yourself to a wealthy tyrant of your own choosing?’

‘That’s right.’

‘So, between Carl and me, I’m the lesser of two evils? The more attractive?’

A frisson of danger lent steel to his light query. She suddenly felt afraid of something, felt fear slicing through her too sensitive, too thin skin.

‘You’re temporary,’ she said bravely. ‘You like temporary. You never hold on to anything for long. Not women or companies. You take what you want and move on.’

‘You really think you’ve done your research on me, don’t you?’ He looked down at her, grimly thoughtful. ‘How can you go back there if you defy Brian so overtly?’

‘I think he’ll accept it when he realises his financial problems are resolved. And he’ll see he can’t reach me any more.’ She’d finally be free of his hold over her.

‘But what will Susan say about you marrying me for my money? Me, the spurned step-nephew, cast out all those years ago? Won’t she be disappointed in you?’

A flush of heat singed her skin. ‘I wouldn’t tell her… I’d have to…’

‘Fake it?’ he jeered softly. ‘Pretend you’re in love with me?’

‘It wouldn’t be for long. Then White Oaks will be safe and Susan can stay there for as long as she has left. Brian can’t bully us into anything. He can’t send either of us away if I own it. I’ll have the power.’

Alessandro regarded her steadily. ‘Sounds like a fine plan when you put it like that.’ He hunched down in front of her and whispered. ‘But what’s in it for me?’

She stared into his gleaming eyes, wondering how to convince him—playing to his sympathetic side seemed unlikely to succeed. ‘I thought you might enjoy it…’ she muttered.

‘What—being married to you?’ That tantalising smile curved his lips, all arrogance.

She blushed furiously. ‘Having revenge on them.’

He pressed his hand to his heart in mock distress. ‘You really don’t think much of me, do you?’ he said slowly, but that edge was still in his eyes.

‘You don’t want to take something from them when they took something from you?’

That glint sharpened. ‘What do you think they took?’

‘Your father’s company.’ She swallowed, remembering that fight and the fury with which Alessandro had stormed out of White Oaks.

There was a moment of pure stillness. She couldn’t tell what he was thinking behind those fiercely burning eyes. She only knew that he was thinking rapidly—but what he was thinking was clear only to him.

‘Hasn’t all your research told you I’m more successful than they are now?’ he asked sharply, standing up and stepping back from her. ‘I don’t waste my time thinking about the past. I don’t need their business. I don’t need your sauces. And I certainly don’t need your insane proposal.’

His rejection hit her in a low, dulling blow. Of course he didn’t. Of course she couldn’t convince him. She was a fool for having thought this could work, but it had been her only plan. She’d been desperate. She still was desperate.

But in the face of his displeasure she fell back into her automatic safety mode. ‘Sorry,’ she muttered tonelessly. She’d been conditioned for years to apologise when confronted with conflict. ‘I’m so sorry.’

Angrily, he muttered something in Italian. Something that sounded viciously impolite. ‘What did you think was going to happen here today?’

She had no clue. She’d not really thought at all. The mad idea had come to her in the middle of the night. He was the only man she knew with the resources, maybe the motivation, and truthfully he had been her only hope. So she’d sneaked out early in the morning and caught the first train to London.

‘What does Carl say about it?’ Alessandro almost snarled. ‘Does he know the bride he’s buying is so unwilling? Can’t you bargain a better deal with him?’

‘He came to see me last night.’ Her skin crawled at the thought of Carl and what he’d said to her. ‘I’d hoped he meant for us to be married in name only, but…’

‘He wants you to have his babies?’ Alessandro’s whole demeanour seemed to sharpen.

It wasn’t funny, it was foul, and it made her escape all the more imperative. ‘He said he’ll take what he wants.’

And apparently he did want her…like that.

Alessandro swiftly strode further away from her. ‘But you don’t want him?’

‘Of course I don’t!’ The thought repulsed her.

Alessandro stood on the other side of his desk, leaning on it. There was a moment as he studied her. She saw him take a careful breath.

‘What if you were to marry me?’ His expression turned speculative. ‘You wouldn’t want to—?’

‘No!’ she interrupted vehemently.

‘No?’ He smiled at the interruption, and that crooked curve to his mouth was sinful. ‘What if I wanted to?’

It was horrendous how attractive his smile was—and that lightness to his eyes…

‘Really? Does your ego need to get any bigger?’ She glared at him.

He’d already said no to her. She already knew he wasn’t interested. He was just teasing her now—his amusement was audible.

‘We both know you have millions of other options,’ she said, completely flustered. ‘I wouldn’t get in your way.’

His eyebrows shot up. ‘Wouldn’t you?’ he asked dryly, before a soft laugh escaped him. ‘You as my wife would be willing to just stand by and watch me with other women?’

She flushed, her brain sending her that one image she’d successfully blocked for years—until today. Because she had watched him with another woman once.

She’d come across them accidentally. She’d been walking through the orchards, alone as always, when she’d spotted them lying in a grassy patch beneath a heavily flowering apricot tree. He had been shirtless and his jeans had been undone, slipping down his thighs. The muscles of his broad, bronzed back had moved powerfully as he’d bent over the pretty student who’d been arched beneath him.

Her sighing whispers had been too soft for Katie to decipher from that distance. But she’d heard the wickedness in the tone of his low, murmured reply and the breathless, rapid response of the woman he was bestowing carnal pleasure upon. He’d literally been devouring her.

Katie had frozen—not even hiding—fascinated and appalled at the sight of such complete intimacy—at his raw masculinity. She’d been an extremely sheltered young teen, still figuring things out and not really understanding what she was seeing.

To be honest, she still didn’t understand it. She’d never met a man who’d made her want to act so wantonly despite the threat of exposure. To be that hedonistic, that caught up in a moment that she wouldn’t care who was around to watch…

After only seconds she’d fled, with the sounds of that woman’s delight echoing in her ears.

She’d told herself it wasn’t her fault. If he was going to pleasure his girlfriend in the orchard—where anyone could have seen them—well, that was his problem. But she’d flushed almost purple that night, when he’d finally graced them with his presence at dinner that evening, almost half an hour late.

‘Got held up,’ he’d offered—not an apology, just a careless fact.

She’d seen him again in the village a few days later—with a different girl hungrily kissing him in an alleyway. His apparent infidelity to that first girl had shocked her. There’d been another girl only a couple of days later.

It had taken the young and naive Katie a while to realise he wasn’t actually in a relationship with any of them. No commitment, no mess—only fun. Alessandro had been incredibly popular and he hadn’t been afraid to make the most of it.

And it seemed every woman who’d crossed his path since was as eager to slide her legs apart and let him do whatever he liked between them… He hadn’t slowed down any in the decade since that last summer he’d come to the estate.

Katie’s quick Internet search on the train this morning had thrown up a billion pictures of him with a billion different women. All beautiful. All as enthusiastic as anything, judging by the look in their eyes. Alessandro Zetticci was an insatiable, arrogant playboy. Which actually made him perfect.

But he wasn’t having her. She wasn’t interested in any of that.

Only now he’d rounded his desk again. He gripped the armrests of her chair, bending so that his nose was only inches from her own. Dawning brilliance lit his eyes.

‘Would you watch, Katie?’ he asked.

Did he somehow know about that awful, embarrassing secret of her past?

‘You’re trying to intimidate me,’ she squeaked. ‘It’s not going to work. I’m not afraid of you.’

He laughed. ‘Perhaps you should be. But perhaps I’m not trying to intimidate you. Perhaps I’m testing you.’

‘For what?’

He lifted a hand, lightly exploring her jawline with the lightest touch. ‘To see if I can seduce you.’

His touch ought to have been easily escapable, but she couldn’t seem to move.

Desperately she quelled the flare of heat deep and low in her belly and deliberately rolled her eyes. ‘Sorry. I’m immune. That’s why we’d be perfect together.’

‘I agree,’ he answered urbanely, but his eyes danced with devilish laughter. ‘Perfect together. In bed.’

‘I’m not going to sleep with you.’

‘So determined…’ His lips curled. ‘Afraid you might catch something?’

It was a low, teasing drawl, but there was a sharp warning underlying his tone that made her wary. She’d been offensively rude in her outright rejection of any kind of intimacy with him. But as if it was even a consideration! He was the one being rude now.

You did just ask him to marry you.

And she had implied that he was a complete man whore.

‘No.’ She flushed uncomfortably, because he kept switching from serious to teasing. ‘I’m just—’

‘Scared you might like it?’ he interpolated with a low chuckle.

Yes, this was the Alessandro Zetticci she’d read about—the irrepressible tease who worked hard but played harder.

‘You really can’t help yourself, can you?’ She glared at him in exasperation. ‘You think you can seduce every woman you meet!’

‘Most don’t need to be seduced.’ He shrugged, then muttered with outrageous insouciance, ‘Most are willing to let me do whatever I want before I even know their name.’

He was so close his words whispered over her lips…so close he seemed to see all her secrets. She closed her eyes—only to regret it instantly. Because now she was even more attuned to his nearness. His heat. His strength. His will. But she knew his words were designed to shock her, to repulse her. Because beneath the seductive slide of his whisper she still heard that steely anger.

She opened her eyes and glared at him. ‘I’m not most women. And I’m not challenging you. This isn’t about that and never will be.’ She drew in a deep breath. ‘If we marry I’ll have no expectations, put no restrictions on you. And I’d expect the same for you.’

He straightened, and from his towering height shot her a censorious look as if he’d suddenly become the epitome of virtue.

‘I may be many things, but a breaker of promises I am not. Even in a civil ceremony I’d promise fidelity, and I’d never break that promise. If you want me to marry you, you’d better agree to the same.’ He was very curt and very clear.

She slammed her hands on the arms of the chair to stop herself slithering down to the floor. Was he going to say yes?

‘You’d—?’

‘Honour our vows for the duration of our marriage. Of course.’

‘But—’

‘Does it really come as that much of a shock?’ He pinched the bridge of his nose.

‘It’s just that you—’

‘I’ve never got married before? No. Never had the desire nor reason to.’

Her jaw hung open. ‘Are you saying you’re going to—?’

‘I’m just ascertaining the rules in play before I decide,’ he pre-empted her coolly. ‘How many lovers do you take in a month?’ he asked. He immediately followed up with another question purely designed to shock. ‘I enjoy sex and generally have it regularly. I assume you’re the same?’

Katie shut her mouth and swallowed. How could he possibly think that she’d have anywhere near the interest he had?

‘The past doesn’t matter,’ she said briskly, fighting down the all-consuming heat this conversation was creating within her. ‘There’s only the future. Best not to dwell on what’s gone before. I’ll not be unfaithful, if that’s what you’d prefer. I have no problem with celibacy.’

‘Well, see…here’s the thing,’ he drawled with an impossibly wicked glint in his eyes. ‘I don’t like celibacy.’

‘We don’t need to be married long,’ she said crossly. ‘I’m sure six months will be long enough to…to…’

‘Ensure you’re left utterly undesirable?’ he finished for her tartly.

‘Get our business affairs straightened out.’ She threw him another exasperated look.

‘Six months of celibacy?’ He clutched his chest and gasped theatrically, apparently appalled at the suggestion.

‘Please yourself,’ she retorted through gritted teeth, goaded to the extreme.

He cocked his head and that devilish smile spread over his too-perfect face. ‘Is that what you do?’

CHAPTER TWO

ALESSANDRO KNEW HE was being outrageous, but he figured she’d asked for it by waltzing into his office and demanding not just money but his damned hand in marriage, whilst casting him as an insatiable libertine at the same time. She seemed to think he was some satyr, unable to control his voracious sexual needs.

Her ‘research’ had flicked his pride, and he’d been unable to resist retaliating by playing it up and making Her Total Primness here blush again. And then again.

Frankly, he’d only agreed to see her out of mild boredom. While he’d remembered her name, he hadn’t remembered much else—he’d always refused to spend any time dwelling on that painful period of his past. But his commonplace curiosity had grown acute when she’d determinedly waited almost two hours to see him, and he’d turned his mind to what few memories he had of her.

She’d been a shy little thing, always hiding in the orchard and the gardens of that massive estate. Pale and too quiet. But she wasn’t that quiet now Brian was trying to make her marry Carl Westin. And not now he’d provoked her.

She was much more interesting when provoked. In fact she’d invigorated what had been lining up to be a tedious day facing a trillion clamouring employees, all of whom wanted a piece of him because he’d spent the last couple of weeks crisscrossing the globe as he shed a stake in one company while acquiring two others. Frankly, he’d wanted a bit of a break.

He’d figured Katie was after money and he’d been right. But her marriage proposal alongside that request had come as a complete shock.

Alessandro had crossed paths with Carl Westin a couple of years ago and the guy was a total jerk. Alessandro might party hard, but he was upfront and honest about it. He didn’t cheat. Carl Westin did—in both his business and his personal life. No way was Katie Collins going to marry him.

But, as snappy as she might be with Alessandro, she was vulnerable to Brian’s bullying.

Brian Fielding, together with his sister Naomi, had forced Alessandro out of his home. They’d taken the company that should have been his. But, most appallingly, they’d all but killed his father.

He picked up his phone, but didn’t take his gaze off Katie.

‘Cancel my next appointment, please, Dominique,’ he instructed his assistant. ‘I’m not to be disturbed.’

His interest was rooted in her absurd request, right? Nothing else. Certainly not physical attraction. From what he could see, given the boring ponytail, she had nondescript brown hair. Her eyes were a mix of green and brown and gold—he supposed they were hazel. And hidden beneath those ill-fitting ugly clothes he suspected there were some tidy curves, but not exactly generous ones.

Alessandro had been with too many women to have a particular ‘type’ but, even so, if he’d passed her on the street he wouldn’t have given Katie Collins a second glance…

Yet there was something about her that was drawing the attention of his more basic instincts. The spark that sometimes lit her eyes, the slight pout of her soft mouth, the luminosity of her pale skin when she fired up… Yeah, it was those unexpected little flashes of spirit. He wanted to see more of them. Actually, to his total bemusement, he wanted to see her sparkle.

What he’d told her was true. He’d achieved far greater success than both Naomi and Brian had in their handling of his father’s company. But Katie was more insightful than he’d acknowledged. The chance for a little revenge was tempting. He could buy White Oaks outright and evict them all—claim Katie’s little sauce company and disband it.

If he wanted to, Alessandro could destroy everything that family owned.

That plan ought to be far more appealing than some mad idea of a mock marriage. But Katie had been desperate enough to come to him rather than run away… She really didn’t feel she could. She was desperate. He’d seen it in her eyes, in the way she’d pushed past her natural reticence and snapped at him when he’d tested her. In the way she wanted to do everything she could to protect the woman she regarded as a mother…

That was a desire he did understand. That was the only thing that might actually sway him. Because once upon a time he’d wanted to do that—but he’d failed.

Grimly he shut down that line of thinking. The wound was too deep to heal and too sore to dwell on. He focused on Katie, sitting rigidly in that chair, clutching her bag, too terrified for his conscience to handle.

‘Do they know you’ve walked out?’ he asked abruptly.

‘I left a note for Susan, so she doesn’t worry.’