Mistress Arrangements: Passion's Mistress / Desert Mistress / Mistress by Arrangement

‘As my wife, there’s no necessity for you to work. Your first priority lies with Ann-Marie.’ The velvet smoothness in his voice should have been sufficient warning, but she was too stubborn to take any heed.

‘I agree,’ she conceded, determined to win points against him. ‘However, as she’ll be at school from eight forty-five until two-thirty, I don’t see why I shouldn’t spend those hours delegating work to whoever will take my place over the next few weeks.’

‘I’ll allow you tomorrow,’ Stefano agreed hardly. ‘But that’s all.’

‘Don’t begin dictating what I can and can’t do!’ Carly said fiercely. She felt defensive, and very, very angry. ‘And don’t you dare imply that I’m an irresponsible mother! What sort of father will you be?’ she demanded. ‘It isn’t nearly enough to provide a child with a beautiful home and numerous possessions. The novelty soon wears off when you can’t be present at the school fête, or attend the end-of-year play.’ Her eyes flashed with fiery topaz as her anger deepened. ‘What happens next week, the week after that, and all the long months ahead?’ she queried fiercely. ‘You’ll be too busy jetting off to God knows where, cementing yet another multi-million-dollar deal. When you are home, you’ll probably leave in the morning before she wakes, and return long after she’s given up any hope of catching a glimpse of you. How am I going to explain that your liaison with fatherhood will be conducted by remote control?’

His eyes were dark and unfathomable, and she was aware of a degree of anger apparent. ‘Why are you so sure it will be?’

‘Because you lead such a high-profile existence,’ she flung in cautiously. ‘It can’t be any other way, damn you!’

He looked at her in silence for what seemed an age, and it was all she could do to hold his gaze. Yet she wouldn’t subvert her own beliefs in deference to a man whose credo was different from her own.

‘Tell me, are you staging a fight as a matter of principle, or merely as an attempt to vent some of your rage?’

‘Both!’

‘With any clear thought to the consequences?’ Stefano pursued, his eyes never leaving hers for a second.

‘Don’t you dare threaten me!’

One dark eyebrow rose in cynical query. ‘If you imagine I’ll take any invective you choose to throw in my direction without retaliation, you’re mistaken,’ he warned silkily.

Carly felt as if she was on a rollercoaster leading all the way down to hell. ‘I’m damned if I’ll play happy families at a flick of your fingers!’

‘I doubt you’ll do or say anything to upset Ann-Marie.’

He was right. She wouldn’t. Yet she desperately wanted to hit out at him for invading her life and turning it upside-down.

‘Do you enjoy the power it gives you to use my daughter as an excuse to blackmail me?’

‘Are you making an allegation?’ Stefano countered in a voice that would have quelled an adversary.

For a few fateful seconds they seemed locked in silent battle, and she felt as if she was shattering into a thousand pieces. ‘It’s the truth!’

He stood regarding her in silence, his eyes darkly inscrutable, yet there was an air of leashed anger apparent, a sense of control that was almost frightening.

‘Quit while you’re ahead, Carly.’

She felt the need to be free of him, and preferably alone. For a few hours at least. ‘I’m going to take a shower and watch television for a while.’

One eyebrow rose fractionally. ‘A desire for solitude?’

‘I’m off duty,’ she declared, uncaring of his reaction.

‘Careful with your claws, my little cat,’ Stefano warned softly. ‘Or I may choose to unsheathe my own.’

There was nothing she could add, so she didn’t even try. Instead, she turned and walked towards their suite, and once inside she carefully closed the door.

He didn’t follow, and she moved into the en suite and shed her clothes, then took a long shower, and, towelled dry, she pulled on a thin cotton shift and emerged into the bedroom, to stand hesitantly, unsure which of the two beds she should occupy.

Dammit, she swore softly. With her luck, she’d choose the wrong one, and then Stefano would be cynically amused by her mistake.

There was only one solution, and she caught up a towelling robe and slid it on, then walked through to the sitting-room, activated the television, and sank into a comfortable chair.

If necessary, she determined vengefully, she’d sleep here, rather than slip into the wrong bed!

Sunday evening television offered the choice of three movies, an intellectual book review, or a play spoken entirely in Hungarian. A karate-kickboxer epic wasn’t her preferred viewing, nor was a terminator blockbuster, and she wasn’t in the mood for a chilling thriller. After switching channels several times, she simply selected one for the sake of it and allowed her attention to wander.

At some stage she must have dozed, for she was aware of a strange sense of weightlessness, a desire to sink more comfortably into arms that seemed terribly familiar.

A small sigh escaped her lips, and she burrowed her face into the curve of a hard, muscular shoulder, then lifted her hands to encircle a male neck.

It felt so good, so right, and she murmured her appreciation. Her lips touched against warm skin, moving involuntarily as they savoured a texture and scent her subconscious recognised—not only recognised, but delighted in the discovery.

Except that she wanted more, and the tip of her tongue ventured out in a tentative exploratory tasting, edging up a deeply pulsing cord in search of a mouth she instinctively knew could bestow pleasure.

Then the barriers between unconsciousness and awareness began to disperse, bringing a horrifying knowledge that, although the arms that held her belonged to the right man, it was the wrong time, the wrong room, and her dream-like state owed nothing to the reality!

For a moment her eyes retained a warm luminescence, a musing witchery, then they clouded with pain before being hidden by two thickly lashed veils as she struggled to be free of him.

‘Put me down!’

‘I was about to,’ Stefano drawled as he placed her between fragrantly clean sheets, and her lashes swept up to reveal intense anger.

His touch was impersonal, yet she felt as if she was on fire, with every separate nerve-end quivering into vibrant life, each individual skin-cell an ambivalent entity craving his touch.

Carly snatched the top sheet and pulled it up to her chin in a defensive gesture. ‘Get away from me!’

His eyes speared hers, darkly mesmeric as she forced herself not to look away.

‘You’re as nervous as a kitten,’ he drawled musingly. ‘Why, when we’ve known each other in the most intimate sense?’

Reaching out, he brushed gentle fingers down the length of her cheek to the edge of her mouth, then traced the curving contour with a stray forefinger. ‘What are you afraid of, cara?’

‘Nothing,’ Carly responded carefully. ‘Absolutely nothing at all.’

Liar, she derided silently. No matter how hard she tried she was unable to still the fast-beating pulse that hummed through her veins, seducing every nerve and fibre until she felt incredibly alive.

His smile was wholly cynical, and his eyes held a gleam of mockery as they conducted a deliberately slow appraisal of her expressive features, lingering over-long on the visible pulsebeat at the base of her throat before travelling up to meet her gaze.

‘Goodnight, Carly,’ he bade her lazily. ‘Sleep well.’

She mutinously refused to comment, and she watched as he turned and walked from the room. Damn him, she cursed silently. She wouldn’t sleep in this bed, this room!

Anger fuelled her resolve, and she flung aside the covers, grabbed hold of her robe, then retreated quietly to an empty suite near by.

It held a double bed—made up in readiness, she discovered—and she slid beneath the covers, then switched off the bedside lamp.