Then it’s my turn with the vows, and as I repeat the words, I can’t help but reach out and adjust the tiara on her head, before pushing a strand of silky black hair back behind her ear. Her eyes widen as my fingertip brushes the tip of her ear, and she goes very still, electricity sparking between us at my touch.
The surprise of it jolts me, because while I enjoyed her scent and found her interesting, I hadn’t planned on seducing a very clearly unwilling woman. But…perhaps she’s not so unwilling after all?
Her lashes lower, hiding her gaze, yet it’s too late. We were both caught off-guard by that spark of chemistry, and now we both know it’s there. Or rather,Iknow it’s there.
I was expecting to have an on-paper wife, while still seeing my usual lovers, but perhaps it’s worth revising that decision. What would all that fire and fury look like turned into passion? Would she be as fierce in bed as she is out of it?
Something inside me shifts, a thread of desire winding tight, but it’s not the time, so I push it aside, taking the ring out of my trouser pocket instead. Then I take her hand and slide it onto her finger as I repeat the vows. It’s a simple band of white gold I bought on the way to the cathedral, but a stray thought tells me I should have had emeralds inlaid on it somewhere, to match her eyes.
Ridiculous. I buy jewels to match the eyes of my mistresses, not my wife.
‘You may kiss the bride,’ the priest says.
Caterina lifts her lashes and looks up at me, her green gaze silently challenging me the way I challenged her to throw my ring at my head.
I dare you to kiss me,she’s saying, and not because she doesn’t want it, she does. I can see it in her eyes, the curiosity and the heat. She wants to know if that spark between us was real or if she was imagining it, and I’m tempted to show her exactly how real it was.
But she’s expecting me to do that, so instead I reach out to cup her face between my palms. Then I bend my head, kiss her chastely on the forehead, before turning and striding into the house.
Chapter Five
Caterina
ISTARE ATthe Wolf’s back as he disappears into the villa, my heart racing, and I don’t know whether to be furious that he kissed me on the forehead like a child, or relieved.
No, I know. I’m relieved. I’m definitely very relieved. Because that would be my first kiss and there’s no way I want that kiss to be from him. Ugh, the very thought of it…
You couldn’t breathe at the very thought of it.
I ignore the voice in my head, because it’s not true, absolutely not. Yet, I can’t deny that when he lifted his long-fingered hands to adjust my tiara, and the tip of his finger brushed my ear as he pushed a lock of hair behind it, a bolt of electricity went through me. Part of me wanted to believe it was only static, but the rest of me knows that’s not what it was. I saw the way his eyes flared. He felt that electricity, too.
And yes, as much as I don’t want to admit it, when he cupped my face between his warm palms and I thought he was going to kiss me, I felt as if I might faint. All I could see was his silver gaze and the heat burning in the depths, and something hot in me stirring and waking up, wanting to play…
But I can’t think about that. I don’t want to. He’s the enemy and the ring on my finger feels heavy, and I still can’t believe that I’m here, at the Argenti villa in Sicily, married to the Sicilian Wolf.
On the helicopter ride over here, I tried thinking through plans on how I could escape or maybe get the information he told me about his intentions to my father, but none of them seemed viable. I don’t have anything with me, not even my phone, and now I’m here at the Argenti villa, my options for escape or at least getting word to Dad, have narrowed considerably.
The late afternoon sun is beating down and the emotional fallout from the last couple of hours is catching up with me. I feel lost, cut adrift, alone in a forest of enemies with no one to turn to and nowhere to go, and married to a complete stranger.
As I’m standing there wondering what the hell to do next, a woman comes over to me and takes my arm, murmuring that she is Maria, the housekeeper, and she will take me to my room. I let her lead me into the villa, all the energy I had to fight with now gone.
Though my temper rouses slightly on the brief tour of the villa, mainly because it’s beautiful, and I don’t want to it to be beautiful, with its whitewashed walls and stone floors. Lots of light streams through tall windows with deep sills, silken carpets creating splashes of colour and softness. The furniture is very old, of dark wood, which contrasts with some of the abstract art on the walls.
Maria takes me upstairs and shows me into a beautiful room that faces the sea. The ivory linen curtains are pulled back from the windows while beneath them sits a squashy couch upholstered in faded pink velvet.
Against the opposite wall is a huge four-poster bed hung with white gauze, an antique dresser standing nearby. Bright cushions that carry the same pink as the couch are scattered on the seats and on the bed. Another silk carpet covers the stone floor, the same faded pink in amongst subtle hues of dusty blue and purple.
Maria gestures to the door on the other side of the room, which apparently leads to the en suite bathroom, and then at the sliding mirrored doors that hide a closet. The master has bought me everything I might need, or so she says, and I’m very tempted to ask if that includes a private plane to take me far away from here, because that’s what I need most of all. But I keep my mouth shut. There’s no point being rude to Maria. None of this is her fault.
Once she leaves me alone, I tear off my tiara and veil, and fling them on the bed. Then I claw at the fastenings of my stupid wedding gown. It feels as if it’s suffocating me and I can’t get it off fast enough. Beneath it I’m wearing a white silk strapless bra and white silk knickers, all lacy and transparent, because I thought Carlo would like them. But they, too, seem ridiculous now, so I claw them off as well until I’m wearing nothing except Vincenzo Argenti’s ring.
I want to pull that off too, and hurl it into the sea, but I have a feeling that he wouldn’t care, which makes hurling it anywhere far less satisfying. In the end, I keep it on as I fling open the closet doors to see if he really did buy me everything I might need.
Looks like Maria wasn’t wrong since it’s full of newly bought clothes, all of them giving off majorcosa nostrawife vibes. I ignore them and instead go to the dresser, pulling open all the drawers to see what else is in there. Sadly, at first glance, there are no practical underwear. It’s all silk and lace, with tiny straps that look incredibly uncomfortable. I finally settle on a pair of purple silk knickers, with a sports bra I manage to unearth in the bottom drawer. There are also some loose black lounge pants in a soft, stretchy fabric that look comfy, so I put them on with an oversized sweatshirt in deep forest green.
They’re familiar, these kinds of clothes. They’re the opposite of dressed-up and put-together, which my father always wanted me to be since it showed me off as a trophy better, and once they’re on, I feel less like a stolen bride, and more like myself.
On top of the dresser are pots and bottles of make-up, along with hairbrushes, eyelash curlers and all kinds of beauty products that I don’t want or need. He’s bought them for the wife he wants, not the woman I am, which is a familiar feeling, and so I ignore them all.
