Marrying the Italian: The Marcolini Blackmail Marriage / The Valtieri Marriage Deal / The Italian Doctor's Bride

‘Stop it,’ Claire said, putting her hands over her ears to try to block the incendiary temptation of his words. ‘Stop doing this. It won’t work.’

He pulled her hands away from her head and brought her up close, pelvis to pelvis, his hot, hard need against her soft, moist ache. ‘What are you frightened of, cara?’ he asked. ‘That you might discover you do not hate me as much as you claim? Is that it?’

Claire refused to answer. She clamped her lips together, glaring at him, her heart pounding with a combination of anger and out-of-control desire.

‘The fact is you do not hate me, Claire,’ he said. ‘You just hate the fact that you still want me.’

‘I do hate you,’ she said, wrenching out of his hold. ‘You slept with that—’

‘Damn you, Claire.’ He cut her off. ‘How many times do I have to tell you there was nothing going on between us?’

‘Your mother told me,’ Claire said, putting up her chin at a combative height. ‘She told me you had been lovers for a long time and were planning to marry, but that I had ruined everything by falling pregnant. She said you would never have married me if it hadn’t been for my accidental pregnancy. She said that Daniela had been unofficially engaged to you for years.’

Antonio felt every muscle in his body tense. He had broken things off with Daniela a couple of months before he had met Claire. Daniela had taken it well, having come to the conclusion herself that their relationship had run its course. She had seemed to understand his need to focus on his career. Yes, they had once or twice laughed off their respective parents’ none-too-subtle hints that a marriage between them would be more than agreeable, but he had never been in love with her, and as far as he could tell she had not been in love with him.

The afternoon Claire had seen them together had been as innocent as it had been coincidental. He had been having a quiet non-alcoholic drink with a colleague, both being on call, when Daniela had turned up, having seen him from the street outside. His colleague had left after a half an hour and Daniela had stayed on, expressing her concern over how Antonio was coping with the strain at home. It had been no secret he and Claire were having problems after the stillbirth of their baby. The last couple of months had been particularly dire, with Claire’s shifting moods. He had done everything in his power to help her, but it had seemed nothing he said or did was what she wanted. She had oscillated between bouts of hysterical accusation and cold stonewalling, shutting him out for days on end.

Daniela had been supportive, and, knowing him as she had for so many years, had understood his private and internal way of processing the pain of his grief in a way Claire had not been ready or willing or even able to understand.

When Claire had come across them in the foyer, hugging as they had said goodbye, she had immediately misconstrued the situation. Daniela had made a diplomatic exit, but Claire had drawn him into a blazing row out on the street, which had been interrupted by an emergency page from the hospital, where one of his patients had begun bleeding post-operatively. By the time he’d got home the following morning, after more than twelve hours of horrendously difficult surgery, Claire had packed her bags and left.

As to what Claire had just intimated about his mother, there was no way Antonio could verify that now. As far as he knew Claire had demanded a large sum of money from his mother, and once his mother had written the cheque Claire had taken it and left the country. He had arrived at the airport just as her plane had taken off. The anger he had felt at that moment had carried him through the weeks and months ahead, and it had been refuelled every time Claire had refused to answer her phone or respond to his e-mails. Pride had prevented him chasing after her, even though not a day had gone past when he hadn’t considered it. He knew it had been stubborn of him, leaving it so long, but he was not the type to beg and plead. He had finally accepted she had moved on with her life, and he had more or less done the same. It had only been when she had started the divorce process that he’d realised what was at stake—and not just his money. They had unfinished business between them, and this time around it was going to be done on his terms and his terms only.

‘Perhaps you misunderstood what my mother said,’ Antonio offered. ‘Her English is not quite as good as it could be.’

Claire’s blue-green eyes sent him a caustic glare. ‘I know what I heard, Antonio,’ she said. ‘And besides, your mother speaks perfectly understandable English. Why don’t you ask her what she said to me that night? Go on—call her up and ask her. Put the phone on speaker. She can hardly deny it with me standing right here listening to every word.’

Antonio sent splayed fingers through his hair again, releasing a breath that caught on something deep inside his chest on its exit. ‘I do not wish to upset my mother right now,’ he said. ‘She has not been well since the death of my father.’

She gave a disdainful snort. ‘You Italians really know how to stick together, don’t you? I know blood is thicker than water and all that, but Marcolini blood is like concrete.’

‘It is not about taking sides, Claire,’ he said. ‘The issues that brought about our estrangement need to be addressed by you and me personally. I do not want to drag in a jury on either side to complicate things any further.’

‘What about Daniela?’ she asked. ‘Have you spoken to her lately?’

‘No, not lately,’ he answered. ‘She got married about a year ago, to a friend of one of my cousins who lives in Tuscany. She is expecting a baby; I am not sure how far along she is now—pretty close to delivery, I should think. I have not spoken to her since my father’s funeral.’

Claire tried to ignore the deep stab of pain she felt every time she heard of someone else’s pregnancy. She seriously wondered sometimes if she would ever be able to feel happy and hopeful for another mother-to-be. How could they be so complacent, so assured of a healthy delivery? Did they really think a good diet and moderate exercise would guarantee them a live baby? She had done all that and more, and look where it had led. She had gone home empty-handed, shattered, shell-shocked. Every tiny bootie and delicately embroidered and knitted outfit had screamed at her from the walls of the beautifully decorated nursery she had seen to herself: where is the baby for all this stuff?

There had been no baby.

Instead there had been a tiny urn of ashes which Claire had carried all the way back to Australia, to give her daughter the interment she felt her baby deserved.

‘If my mother somehow misinformed you about my relationship with Daniela, I am deeply sorry,’ Antonio’s voice broke through her painful thoughts. ‘The only excuse I can offer on her behalf is that she was probably concerned our marriage was on the rocks, and thought it would help you to come to some sort of decision over whether or not to continue with it.’

Claire hugged her arms close to her chest, her teeth savaging her bottom lip as she thought about Antonio’s explanation for his mother’s behaviour. It sounded reasonable on the surface. Their marriage certainly hadn’t been a rose-strewn pathway, and they hadn’t exactly been able to hide it from his family. Claire cringed at the thought of how often she had sniped at Antonio in their presence towards the end.

Doubts started to creep up and tap her on the shoulder with ghost-like fingertips. What if she had got it totally wrong? What if what she had seen that day had been exactly as Antonio had tried to explain it at the time?

Claire’s own insecurities, which had plagued her from the beginning of their hasty marriage, had made her vulnerable to suggestion. She had immediately jumped to the conclusion Daniela and Antonio had enjoyed a mid-afternoon tryst in the hotel that day. She had not for a moment considered any other explanation. But then maybe she hadn’t wanted to? Claire thought in retrospect. Maybe Antonio was right about his mother. Rosina Marcolini had been concerned her daughter-in-law was miserably unhappy, and had been so from the start. She had probably assumed Claire was no longer in love with her son, so had given her a way out of the situation. Rosina had obviously told her son it was Claire who had asked her for money, not she who had offered it, but proving it now was going to be difficult—unless she could challenge his mother face to face.

Claire looked up at Antonio. ‘When you didn’t come home at all that night I assumed you were with Daniela.’

He frowned at her. ‘But don’t you remember I got an emergency page to go back to Theatre?’ he asked. ‘When I saw how bad things were with the patient I asked one of the theatre staff to call you to let you know I was going to be late. She tried several times to call, but each time it was engaged or went through to the message service. In the end I told her to give up, as I did not want to be distracted from the difficult case I was working on. The patient was in a bad way and I needed to focus.’

Claire bit her lip again. She had been so angry and upset she had turned her mobile off and left the landline off the hook. It had only been after Antonio’s mother had dropped by and had that short but pointed conversation with her that she’d decided to pack her bags and leave.

Antonio came closer and took her hands in his. ‘I got home at six in the morning to find you had gone,’ he said. ‘I lost valuable time thinking you had gone to stay with one of the friends you had made from the Italian class you attended. By the time it was a reasonable hour to call one of them to check you had already boarded the plane. I got to the airport just in time to see it take off. I was angry—angrier than I had ever been in my life. I could not jump on the next plane to follow you as I had patients booked in for weeks ahead. So I decided to let you go. I thought perhaps some time with your family would help you. God knows nothing I did ever seemed to work. But when you consistently refused to take my calls I realised it was over. I thought it was best you got on with your life while I got on with mine.’

Claire lowered her gaze to look at their linked hands. There were no guarantees on their current relationship. He had not made any promise of extending their reconciliation beyond the three-month period. She knew he desired her, but then he was in a foreign country without a mistress at the ready. What better way to fill in the time than with his wayward wife—the one who had got away, so to speak? A man had his pride, after all, and Antonio Marcolini had more than his fair share of it. Claire had done the unthinkable to him. Walking out on him without once begging to be taken back.

This set-up he had orchestrated might very well be a cleverly planned plot to serve his own ends. He knew a divorce would be costly; he no doubt realised he had to keep her sweet as so much was now at stake—his father’s millions, for one thing. A temporary affair would stall divorce proceedings for several months. Long enough for him to find some way out of handing her millions of dollars in settlement.

She pulled her hands out of his. ‘I think you did the right thing in leaving me to get on with my life,’ she said. ‘We both needed time to regroup.’

‘Perhaps,’ he said, looking at her for a long moment. ‘But five years is a long time, Claire.’

‘Yes, and I needed every minute of it,’ she said, with another lift of her chin.

His mouth thinned. ‘How many lovers have there been? How many men have come and gone from your bed?’

Her eyes flashed at him. ‘I hardly see what business that is of yours.’

He reached for her hands again, tethering her to him with long, strong fingers. ‘How soon did you replace me?’ he asked, holding her gaze with the searing heat of his.

She tried to get out of his hold but his fingers tightened. ‘Why do you want to know?’ she asked, glaring up at him.

His jaw tensed, a nerve at the side of his mouth pulsing like a miniature hammer beneath his skin. ‘Have you had casual affairs, or something more permanent?’ he asked.

‘There’s been no one permanent,’ Claire said, tugging at his hold again. ‘Now, let me go. You’re hurting me.’

He looked down at his hands around her wrists and loosened his hold without releasing her. His thumbs began a slow stroke of the underside of each wrist, making her spine lose its rigid stance. Claire closed her eyes against the tide of longing that flowed through her. His body was so close she could feel its tempting warmth. The urge to feel his hardness against her again was suddenly irresistible, and she tilted towards him before she could stop herself. It was a betraying movement, but she was beyond caring. For some reason his demonstration of jealousy had stirred her, making her wonder if he felt something for her after all. It had been so long since she had felt anything but this aching sadness and emptiness inside. Would it be so very wrong to succumb to a moment of madness? Making love with Antonio would make her forget everything but the magic of his touch, how he could make her feel, how he could make her body explode time and time again with passion. It was what she wanted; it was what they both wanted.

Antonio held her from him. ‘No, Claire,’ he said firmly. ‘Not like this. Not in anger and recrimination.’

Claire looked up at him in confusion. ‘I thought your whole idea was to get me back into your bed as quickly as possible?’

His expression left her little to go on. ‘I am not denying my intention of resuming a physical relationship with you, Claire, but if I were to follow through on your invitation just now I am sure you would hate me all the more tomorrow.’

She raised her brows at him. ‘Scruples, Antonio?’ she asked. ‘Well, well, well—who would have thought?’

He stepped away from her, his mouth once again pulled into a taut line. ‘If you would like to shower and change, we have a charity function to attend this evening,’ he said. ‘The dress is formal. You have just under an hour to get ready.’

Claire frowned. ‘You expect me to come with you?’

His look was ruthlessly determined. ‘I expect you to be by my side, as any other loving wife would want to be. No public displays of temper, Claire, do you understand?’

She pressed her lips together in resentment, not trusting herself to speak.