The Italian Demands His Heirs

She checked her emails and was surprised to find that she had an appointment at ten with someone from the top floor that she had never heard of. She ran the name against the staff list and couldn’t find it. Did that mean that Janice’s rumour was true and that the process was already starting? Telling herself not to jump to conclusions, she kept quiet about the email.

‘Miss Fox?’ The receptionist checked when Vivi arrived at the top floor, leaving her desk to show Vivi where to go.

‘Who is this person I’m to see?’ Vivi questioned helplessly.

‘The new owner of the business. I’m not supposed to mention his name. It’s all very hush-hush,’ the woman told her apologetically.

Registering that Janice’s rumour was true, Vivi raised her brows in silence while wondering why a junior member of the marketing team would qualify for an appointment with the new owner. Some particular query? Then why not call up Janice?

But as the door was knocked on deferentially and duly opened wide, all suddenly became clear as Raffaele di Mancini swung round from the view he had been contemplating from the window of the contemporary office.

‘Come in, Vivi,’ he instructed cool as ice.

Vivi was frozen with shock on the threshold, her slender body rigid with tension because Raffaele’s sudden appearance in her life in an environment where she could not tell him to go jump off a cliff was as disturbing as it was horrifying.

Evidently grasping that reality for himself, Raffaele crossed the room, tugged her over the threshold as if she were a small and hesitant child and closed the door behind her. ‘Now let’s talk like grown-ups,’ he advised, disconcerted by the changes in her.

The smooth swathe of copper hair he recalled had transformed into a gorgeous foaming mane of silky curls, rather like a woman in a pre-Raphaelite portrait, he found himself vaguely acknowledging. Add in the china pale complexion and the bright blue eyes above that full pink mouth and you had a woman whom he might despise, but whose attractions added up to a quite remarkable level of beauty. Of course, he had noticed that she was stunning before, that being a fact that no man would fail to note, he reasoned, impatient with the way in which his brain was suddenly shooting out random thoughts like a shotgun. There she stood in an undeniably plain straight black skirt and pale blue shirt that still highlighted the perfection of her tall, slender figure with its modest curves. She stood about five feet nine in height and Raffaele had liked that about her because he preferred taller women, being six feet four himself.

‘I’m not staying. I refuse to be manipulated like this!’ Vivi exclaimed, spinning round to head back to the door.

‘You walk out that door now, I start having redundancies listed,’ Raffaele informed her, reckoning that he was likely to learn a lot about Vivi Fox—formerly Mardas—and her character in the next few minutes.

White as snow at that unveiled threat, Vivi spun back. ‘You can’t do that... I mean, just because I don’t want to speak to you? That would be outrageous!’ she protested in disbelief.

‘As the new owner of Hacketts Tech, I can be as outrageous as I like. Any regrets that you didn’t simply agree to talk to me last night on the phone?’ Raffaele elevated an ebony brow, all sardonic and cool, and it made her want to punch him in the gut. ‘You see, I don’t play games when I’m challenged, I play hardball.’

Vivi was chilled by that warning but she refused to let him see that. ‘Like I don’t already know that?’ she quipped, a fine auburn brow lifting.

‘Evidently, you didn’t,’ Raffaele pointed out while spinning out a chair for her to occupy. ‘Now, please take a seat.’

‘I prefer to stand, since I’m not planning on staying long,’ Vivi asserted, staying where she was, determined to show no weakness.

‘Are you normally this contrary?’ Raffaele breathed in exasperation, fighting a ridiculous urge to lift her off her feet and simply plonk her down in the designated spot. ‘Or is it that you’re childish?’

Refusing to look directly at him, Vivi shrugged her unconcern although a faint hint of colour warmed her translucent cheeks. ‘You can make your own mind up about that, I’m sure.’

‘Why do you think I want to speak to you?’

‘Because, apparently, my grandfather has made what he terms an “irresistible proposition” to you in return for which he expects you to marry me...in name only,’ Vivi recited with precision.

For a split second, Raffaele toyed with the idea of telling her the truth: that he was being blackmailed. But then what would that mean to her? Why would she care what happened to Arianna, who had not seen her or spoken to her in two years? And even more cogently, did he really want to tell a woman he couldn’t trust just how vulnerable his kid sister was? What if she, in a spirit of retaliation, went to the press to expose Arianna’s secrets? What if she was just like her rancorous grandfather?

Vivi studied Raffaele closely from beneath her lashes, absolutely hating the fact that her heart was racing so fast it felt as though it were bouncing inside her chest. He unnerved her, he always had, she told herself soothingly. Who could help being intimidated by such a very large and powerful man? But for all that, he was still the most beautiful man she had ever seen in her life and even that simple acknowledgement of what was right before her cut through her defences, ensuring that her every muscle went rigid with stress. What was it about him that smashed the composure she had no trouble maintaining with other men?

His cropped hair reflected the light above as dark as the black-as-sloes eyes welded to her in silence. He had perfect symmetrical bone structure, as perfect as a Michelangelo carving in marble. The bronzed tone of his skin, the high cheekbones, the straight nose and the faintly shadowed strong jaw enhancing that wide sensual mouth all played into the same striking effect he had had on her the first time she met him. But she had grown up since then, learned a lot since then, she reminded herself with angry urgency, studiously dragging her gaze from him again and choosing to settle down into the chair she had refused only minutes earlier because sitting made it easier not to look at him.

‘That “irresistible proposition”,’ Vivi repeated drily. ‘You’re rich. You really don’t need to be richer unless you’ve suffered a reverse in circumstances since we last met?’

Incredulous at the tilt of her chin in question, Raffaele gritted his perfect white teeth together because she was making him angry and he didn’t ‘do’ angry with anyone. Angry was out of control, angry was everything that Raffaele always guarded against and restrained and suppressed. ‘No, my circumstances are unchanged,’ he murmured flatly, struggling to combat the temper she brought out in him with her unstudied insolence.

Nobody spoke to Raffaele with scorn, nobody ever had before and nobody else would have dared. His lean brown hands coiled into controlled fists. He could suck it up for Arianna, he told himself urgently, he was too proud, it would probably do his character a world of good...but if he ever got the chance for payback he knew he would be grabbing at it with two very greedy hands because Vivi’s disrespectful attitude infuriated him.

‘You would really be prepared to marry me just to make a profit?’ Vivi pressed, finding that so hard to believe.

His dark eyes glittered as though someone had shot them through with diamonds and she blinked, dragging her attention back from him again, disturbed again by his effect on her concentration. ‘Why not?’ he asked drily.

Vivi clasped her hands together on her lap, in no way as cool as she wanted to be in his presence. He had disconcerted her because she would have sworn he was the last man alive to be seduced merely by money. But then what did she really know about Raffaele di Mancini? Hadn’t she foolishly believed that she was getting to know him and then been soundly disabused of that belief when he’d turned round and humiliated her, absolutely humiliated her, by giving way to the unforgivable conviction that she was a woman willing to sell her body for money? She really knew nothing about Raffaele. He was extremely rich but clearly desired to be even richer and, if that were the case, it meant that only she was preventing him from reaching that goal. And that dismayed her because it meant that both her grandfather and Raffaele were ranged against her as opponents, which was very much the same as sticking her between a rock and a hard place.

‘I don’t want to marry you,’ Vivi murmured in a very quiet voice as she stared at the wall to the left of him. ‘I don’t want anything to do with you.’

Frustration lanced through Raffaele at finding her as difficult as her grandfather had forecast. He had been so sure in his own head that she would snatch at the opportunity to become his wife, seduced by his social standing and a need for revenge. Instead she was sitting there in front of him like a stiff little marionette doll placed in a chair and refusing to react.

Raffaele took a new tack. ‘There’s nothing inherently shameful about having been an escort,’ he breathed tautly. ‘It’s how far you go in that role. If it was merely companionship you offered, there’s nothing wrong with it.’

‘Oh, come on!’ Vivi flashed back at him, animation brightening her formerly still and shuttered face, bright blue eyes taking on a violet hue as she glanced back at him less warily than before. ‘You know that you don’t really believe that, Raffaele. You believed that I was flogging my body for money to anyone who offered sufficient inducement and you acted accordingly and treated me like dirt!’ she condemned.

‘I did not treat you like dirt,’ Raffaele intoned grittily.

‘You blamed me for the risky decisions your sister made. I didn’t ask her to take off her clothes for that modelling portfolio she was so set on having done!’ she argued angrily, wishing that recollection still didn’t hurt enough to make her angry. ‘She did that all on her own. And when she was approached to do escort work because nobody at the agency knew that she was independently wealthy....how was that anything to do with me? I was only the receptionist on the front desk, a humble employee. I didn’t know what was going on at that place. I wasn’t one of the models doing escort work on the side!’

‘So you say,’ Raffaele responded between gritted teeth because he didn’t believe a word of what she was telling him. A receptionist? Did she think he was stupid? A receptionist with that beauty and that figure? Of course she had been one of the models and the receptionist job had merely been a safe cover story for his benefit, and Arianna’s. It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her that the average humble receptionist couldn’t afford the red-soled shoes she had been captured in print wearing the day the brothel had been raided, but in the circumstances it would be stupid to wind her up more. The newspaper concerned had made much of the very expensive designer apparel she had been wearing, implying that she was a very exclusive prostitute.

Vivi compressed her lips, totally aware that he didn’t believe her. He was such a snob, she thought sourly, so ready to credit nasty stuff about her simply because she had been downright poor in comparison to his sister and himself. What other reason could he have for being so suspicious? It wasn’t as if she had acted all alluring with him, was it? Vivi didn’t know how, didn’t have sufficient experience or the desire to act alluring with any man. She wasn’t even very good at flirting because generally the men she met were bolder and cruder than flirting required.

‘I’m not going to apologise for the fact that I dislike you,’ Vivi fired at him.

‘I don’t need you to like me to marry me in the kind of paper marriage your grandfather requires,’ Raffaele shot back in exasperation.

‘Well, there would be nothing in it for me,’ Vivi fielded, struggling not to think about her duty in John and Liz’s situation of unsettled debts. For yes, there would be something in it for her, she reflected guiltily. In fact, there would be more than one advantage to marrying him. It would help John and Liz, it would please her grandfather and leave her blessedly free to get on with the rest of her life as she saw fit with nobody to please but herself. It would release all her worries but...it would also put poor Zoe in the hot seat in her place and how could she allow that?

‘If I offered money, diamonds...’ Raffaele murmured silkily, seeking her weakness, for he was convinced there had to be one.

‘Stop right there!’ Vivi cut in angrily. ‘How could you bribe me into doing it? My grandfather would give me almost anything I wanted...’

Except the one thing she needed, which was John and Liz’s mortgage debt paid off, she completed inwardly.

Resentment darted through her at the reality that her grandfather was holding what was a ridiculously small amount of money on his terms over his granddaughters’ heads in an attempt to force them into doing his bidding. Winnie’s husband, Eros, might have been trying to find a way of getting around that fact and spiking her grandfather’s big guns but he had not, so far, contrived to do so. She needed to phone her sister, though, and check out the latest news on that front.

‘Then we would appear to have reached an impasse, for the moment,’ Raffaele tacked on because he refused to credit that he wouldn’t find a means to achieve her agreement. He never failed at anything he set out to do and saw this situation as no different. Given sufficient time and attention, he would solve the riddle of her reluctance and come up with the magic winning combination. One way or another, he told himself grimly, he would lock her down to protect Arianna.

‘We’ll have dinner tonight,’ he told her flatly.

Vivi tossed her head back, curling ringlets of copper dancing back from her triangular face, bright dark blue eyes defiant. ‘No, we won’t.’

‘Tomorrow night, then.’

The soft full pink lips he couldn’t take his eyes off tightened into a surprisingly hard line. ‘No.’