Hot Christmas Nights: Shameful Secret, Shotgun Wedding / His for Revenge / Mistletoe Not Required. Anne OliverЧитать онлайн книгу.
able to start buying property myself. And I was rather good at it—or, rather, I had a talent for spotting places ahead of the market. I bought in down-town New York before it became the fashionable thing to do. I speculated in areas of London which popular thinking said would never take off—but which soared. Buy low and sell high—it’s not an original concept, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. It’s how I built up my business into what it is today.’
Cassie thought how animated his face had become as he’d talked about his business—it had been the most alive she’d seen it apart from when he was making love to her. She could see that it must have mended his wounded pride and brought him immense satisfaction to make money for himself, rather than having it easy by inheriting it. But Cassie’s question hadn’t really been about the money. She had been far more interested in the other part of the betrayal.
‘And what about your ex-girlfriend?’ she questioned carefully. ‘What happened to her?’
‘Gabriella? Oh, she married my brother and they’re still together. In fact, they have a daughter and are living on the family estate.’
Cassie stared into his face, searching for clues about how he felt but there was nothing other than the little flicker of a pulse at his temple and his voice sounded completely casual. Almost too casual. Did he still hanker after the woman who had betrayed him? she wondered. And was that betrayal the reason why he had never married—why a man as gorgeous as he was should live a life which seemed essentially lonely at its heart?
‘Oh, Giancarlo,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so sorry.’
At her unasked-for words of sympathy Giancarlo stilled, wondering why he had said so much—and why to her? Because she had that cute little way of asking—of widening her violet eyes—so that uncharacteristically he had found himself telling her? His mouth hardened. Well, she need not imagine that this was the first of many confidences he would share with her—or that she had found the key to ‘understanding’ him. He would tell her the truth and, although it might hurt her a little now, it would warn her off amassing much greater hurt in the future.
‘Please don’t waste your sorrow on me, Cassandra,’ he advised softly. ‘Don’t they say that it is hardship which hones the character? And can’t you see that it is immensely more satisfying to have made my own fortune than to have it bestowed on me by an accident of birth?’
‘I wasn’t thinking about…about the money,’ Cassie said hesitantly. ‘But more about your girlfriend.’
Did she really imagine that he was still carrying a torch for the woman who had been nothing but an out-and-out gold-digger—someone who could be bought by the highest bidder? ‘Again, your sentiments are misplaced, Cassandra,’ he said silkily, his eyes glittering out a distinct warning. ‘You see, in many ways she did me a big favour. It taught me early in life the valuable lesson of never trusting a woman.’
‘WHAT is that monstrosity hanging on the front door?’
Cassie waited until Giancarlo had put his briefcase down in the hall before drawing a deep breath. ‘It’s a Christmas wreath.’
He turned to her, his eyes narrowed. ‘Forgive me, I phrased myself badly, bella. I know exactly what it is. I meant—what the hell is it doing there?’
‘I thought it looked…pretty.’
‘And I thought I told you that I don’t do Christmas.’
Cassie swallowed. ‘I know you did—I just don’t understand why.’
‘Because it’s nothing but misrepresentation. It allows sentiment to masquerade as emotion, depicts unrealisti-cally happy families and dresses up greed as some sort of seasonal need.’
‘Bah-humbug!’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Excuse me?’
‘It’s a joke. Something you say about people who don’t like Christmas. People like you.’
‘I think you’re missing the point, cara. When I say that I don’t like Christmas it means you should heed my words—not attempt to change my mind. Especially after a long day at work when I want to be greeted with nothing more controversial than a kiss.’
Cassie moved into his arms. ‘No, I suppose not.’
Giancarlo saw that her lips had softened just the way they always did when he was about to kiss her—but he heard the unmistakable trace of defiance in her soft voice. ‘And anyway, where did you get the money to buy such a magnificent monstrosity—when you have refused point-blank to accept any funds from me?’ Her stubborn refusal to do so had at first made him suspicious—for he couldn’t believe that there was a woman alive who wouldn’t itch to be given free use of his credit card during her tenure as his mistress.
He had tried insisting that she would need money—in order to go shopping. And that was when she had told him that she had no intention of doing anything as dull as shopping while she was installed in his London town house. That she could go shopping any time and she wasn’t particularly into consumerism. He remembered his surprise when he realised that she actually meant it. And that she intended spending her days enjoying the city for free—by visiting the many galleries and parks the capital had to offer.
But now it seemed that Cassandra—who would sigh wistfully whenever they passed a tacky Christmas window display—had finally succumbed and given into the temptation of a seasonal wreath.
‘I made it,’ she said suddenly as his lips brushed against hers.
‘Made what?’
‘The wreath.’
‘You can’t have made it. It looks far too professional.’
‘But I did, Giancarlo—we do sell crafts in our shop, you know, and we are supposed to know something about them. I found a sweet park-keeper in Kensington Gardens, who let me pick some holly and ivy—and I asked your driver if he had any wire I could use. And then I found the base in a cheap little—’
‘Enough!’ protested Giancarlo, but for a moment he was laughing as he bent his lips to her ear. ‘I had no idea that my mistress could be so damned stubborn.’
‘Didn’t you?’ she questioned, winding her arms around his neck. She was about to tease him back—to say something on the lines of, Well, maybe you have a lot to learn, Giancarlo. Except that wouldn’t be true. He didn’t want to learn anything about her, not really—and even if he did, there was no time left in which to do it.
The hours had become days and the days had become weeks—and there were only a few days before their arrangement came to an end. Five days until Christmas Eve—when she would be dispatched back to Cornwall like a parcel which had just caught the last post.
And her time with Giancarlo would be over for ever.
She tried not to dwell on it—to think instead of the pleasure she had had with him. All the shows, the films and the dinners they had shared—and her glorious and continuing education in the joys of sex, taught by a true master of the art. It had been just the two of them—as if the rest of the world didn’t matter—isolated in their own erotic little bubble.
And all the while she had been trying not to focus on the time which was draining away and bringing the day of her departure closer and closer—but it wasn’t easy. Especially not when you had started to care for a man who had tacitly warned you that to care for him would be a complete waste of time. But the human heart was stubbornly impervious to reason, or warnings. Sometimes it made you long for the things you could never have…
She broke away from his kiss and looked up at him. ‘So can we keep the wreath?’
‘That depends.’