Inherited By Ferranti

Sierra’s stomach clenched at the prospect of spending a night under the same roof as Marco Ferranti. Of taking a bath, changing clothes...everything making her feel vulnerable. He must have seen something in her face for he added silkily, ‘Surely you’re not worried for your virtue? Trust me, cara, I wouldn’t touch you with a ten-foot bargepole.’

She flinched at both the deliberate use of the endearment and the contempt she saw in his face. The casual cruelty had been second nature to her father, but it stung coming from Marco Ferranti. He’d been kind to her once.

‘Good,’ she answered when she trusted her voice. ‘Because that’s the last thing I’d want.’

His gaze darkened and he took a step towards her. ‘Are you sure about that?’

Sierra held her ground. She knew her body had once responded to Marco’s, and even with him emanating raw, unadulterated anger she had a terrible feeling it would again. A single caress or kiss and she might start to melt, much to her shame. ‘Very sure,’ she answered in a clipped voice, and then she turned towards the stairs without another word.

She found Marco’s things in one of the guest bedrooms; he hadn’t taken the master bedroom for himself and she wondered why. It was all his now, every bit of it. The villa, the palazzo in Palermo, the Rocci business empire of hotels and real estate holdings. Her father had given everything to the man he’d seen as a son, and left his daughter with nothing.

Or almost nothing. Carefully she took the velvet pouch out from the pocket of her skirt. The pearl necklace and sapphire brooch that had been her mother’s before she married were hers now. She had no idea why her father had allowed her to have them; had it been a moment of kindness on his deathbed, or had he simply been saving face, trying to seem like the kind, grieving father he’d never been?

It didn’t matter. She had a keepsake to remind her of her mother, and that was all she’d wanted.

Quickly, Sierra slipped out of her wet clothes and took a short, scaldingly hot shower. She dressed in a soft grey T-shirt and tracksuit bottoms of Marco’s; it felt bizarrely intimate to wear his clothes, and they swam on her. She used one of his belts to keep the bottoms from sliding right off her hips, and combed her hair with her fingers, leaving it hanging damply down her back.

Then, hesitantly, she went downstairs. She would have rather hidden upstairs away from Marco until the storm passed but, knowing him, he’d most likely come and find her. Perhaps it would be better to deal with the past, get that initial awful conversation out of the way, and then they could declare a silent truce and ignore each other until she was able to leave.

She found him in the sitting room, crouched in front of the fire he was fanning into crackling flame. He’d changed into jeans and a black T-shirt and the clothes fitted him snugly, emphasising his powerful chest and long legs, every inch of him radiating sexual power and virility.

Sierra stood in the doorway, conscious of a thousand things: how Marco’s damp hair had started to curl at the nape of his neck, how the soft cotton of the T-shirt she wore—his T-shirt—rubbed against her bare breasts. She felt a tingling flare of what could only be desire and tried to squelch it. He hated her now, and in any case she knew what kind of man he was. How could she possibly desire him?

He glanced back at her as she came into the room, and with a shivery thrill she saw an answering flare of awareness in his own eyes. He straightened, the denim of his jeans stretching across his powerful thighs, and Sierra’s gaze was drawn to the movement, to the long, fluid length of his legs, the powerful breadth of his shoulders. Once he would have been hers, a thought that had filled her with apprehension and even fear. Now she felt a flicker of curiosity and even loss for what might have been, and she quickly brushed it aside.

The man was handsome. Sexy. She’d always known that. It didn’t change who he was, or why she’d had to leave.

‘Come and get warm.’ Marco’s voice was low, husky. He gestured her forward and Sierra came slowly, reluctant to get any closer to him. Shadows danced across the stone hearth and her bare feet sank into the thick, luxuriously piled carpet.

‘Thank you,’ she murmured without looking at him. The tension in the room was thick and palpable, a thousand unspoken words and thoughts between them. Sierra stared at the dancing flames, having no idea how to break the silence, or whether she wanted to. Perhaps it would be better to act as if the past had never happened.

‘When do you return to London?’ Marco asked. His voice was cool, polite, the question that of an acquaintance or stranger.

Sierra released the breath she’d bottled in her lungs without realising. Maybe he would make this easy for her. ‘Tomorrow.’

‘Did you not think you’d have affairs to manage here?’

She glanced at him, startled, saw how his silvery eyes had narrowed to iron slits, his mouth twisted mockingly. His questions sounded innocuous, but she could see and feel the latent anger underneath the thin veneer of politeness.

‘No. I didn’t expect my father to leave me anything in his will.’

‘You didn’t?’ Now he sounded nonplussed, and Sierra shrugged.

‘Why would he? We’ve neither spoken nor seen each other in seven years.’

‘That was your choice.’

‘Yes.’

They were both silent, the only sound the crackling of the fire, the settling of logs in the grate. Sierra had wondered how much Marco guessed of her father’s abuse and cruelty. How much he would have sanctioned. The odd slap? The heaping of insults and emotional abuse? Did it even matter?

She’d realised, that night she’d left, that she could not risk it. She’d been foolish to think she could, that she could entrust herself to any man. Leaving Marco had been as much about her as about him.

‘Why did you come back here, to this villa?’ Marco asked abruptly, and Sierra looked up from her contemplation of the fire.

‘I told you—’

‘To pay your respects. To what? To whom?’

‘To my mother. Her grave is in the family plot on the estate.’

He cocked his head, his silvery gaze sweeping coldly over her. ‘And yet you didn’t return when your mother was ill. You didn’t even send a letter.’

Because she hadn’t known. But would she have come back, even if she had known? Could she have risked her father’s wrath, being under his hand once more? Sierra swallowed and looked away.

‘No answer?’ Marco jibed softly.

‘You know the answer. And anyway, it wasn’t a question.’

He shook his head slowly. ‘You are certainly living up—or should I say down—to my expectations.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘For seven years I’ve wondered just how cold a bitch I almost married. Now I know.’

The words felt like a slap, sending her reeling. She blinked past the pain, told herself it didn’t matter. ‘You can think what you like.’

‘Of course I can. It’s not as if you’ve ever given me any answers, have you? Any possible justification for what you did, not just in leaving me, but in deserting your family?’

She didn’t reply. She didn’t want to argue with Marco, and in any case he hadn’t really been asking her a question. He’d been stating a fact, making a judgement. He’d made his mind up about her years ago, and nothing she could say would change it now, not even the truth. Besides, he’d been her father’s right-hand man for over a decade. Either he knew how her father had treated his family, or he’d chosen not to know.

‘You have nothing to say, Sierra?’

It was the first time he’d called her by her first name and it sent a shiver of apprehensive awareness rippling through her. He sounded so cold. For one brief blazing second she remembered the feel of his lips on hers when he’d kissed her in the garden. His hands on her body, sliding so knowingly up to cup her breasts; the electric tingle of excitement low in her belly, kindling a spark she hadn’t even known existed, because no man had ever touched her that way. No man had ever made her feel so desired.

Mentally, Sierra shrugged away the memory. So the man could kiss. Marco Ferranti no doubt had unimaginable sexual prowess. He’d probably been with dozens—hundreds—of women. It didn’t change facts.

‘No,’ she told him flatly. ‘I have nothing to say.’

* * *

Marco stared at Sierra, at the cool hauteur on her lovely face, and felt another blaze of anger go off like a firework in his gut. How could she be so cold?

‘You know, I admired how cool you were, all those years ago,’ he told her. Thankfully, his voice sounded as flat as hers, almost disinterested. He’d given away too much already, too much anger, too much emotion. He’d had seven years to get over Sierra. In any case, it wasn’t as if he’d ever loved her.

‘Cool?’ Sierra repeated. She looked startled, wary.

‘Yes, you were so self-possessed, so calm. I liked that about you.’ She didn’t reply, just watched him guardedly. ‘I didn’t realise,’ Marco continued, his tone clipped as he bit off each word precisely, ‘that it was because you had no heart. You were all ice underneath.’ Except she hadn’t been ice in his arms.