man’s expression changed suddenly, as if he finally realised the reason for her near panic.
‘You misunderstand me.’ His voice was arctic. ‘The business proposition I want you to consider has nothing to do with sex.’
Magda stared at him, taking in his expensive male gorgeousness. Reality came back with a vengeance. Of course a man like him would not sexually proposition a woman like her. Seeing herself through those disdainful eyes, suddenly she felt as if she were two inches high. Mortification flooded through her.
Abruptly, she felt the weight of her cleaning box taken from her.
‘Come into the kitchen,’ said the man, ‘and I will explain.’
Magda sat, completely frozen, on one of the high stools set against the kitchen bar. Benji miraculously slept on, snug in his baby chair on the floor.
‘Say…say that again?’ she asked faintly.
‘I will pay you the sum of one hundred thousand pounds,’ the man spelt out in clipped, accented tones, ‘for you to be married to me—quite legally—for six months, at the end of which period we shall file for divorce by mutual consent. You will need to accompany me to Italy for…legal reasons. Then you will return here, and your living expenses will be paid by me. On our divorce you will receive one hundred thousand pounds, no more. Do you understand?’
No, thought Magda. I don’t understand. All I understand is that you’re nuts.
But it seemed unwise to point this out to the man sitting on the other side of the bar from her. She was acutely, utterly uncomfortable being here. And not just because the man was making such an absurd proposition to her.
It was also because he was, quite simply, the most devastating male she had ever seen—inside or outside the covers of a glossy magazine. He had lean, slim looks, very Italian, but with an edge about him that kept his heart-stoppingly handsome face from looking soft. He had beauty, all right, but it was male beauty, honed and planed, and the long eyelashes swept past obsidian eyes that had an incredibly dangerous appeal to them.
‘You don’t believe me, do you?’
The question caught her on the hop, interrupting her rapt, if surreptitious gazing at him, and all she could do was open her mouth and then close it again.
A tight, humourless smile twisted at his mouth, changing the angles of his face. Something detonated deep inside Magda, but she had no time to pay any attention to it. He was speaking again.
‘I would be the first to concede the situation is…bizarre. But, nevertheless—’ he spread his hands above the bar, and Magda noticed how beautiful they were, long and slender, with a steely strength to them despite their immaculate manicure ‘—I do, as it happens, require a wife at very short notice, for a very particular purpose. Perhaps I should point out,’ he went on, in a voice that made her feel ashamed of her own lack of physical appeal in the presence of a man with such a super-abundance of it, ‘that the marriage will be in name only. Tell me, do you have a passport?’
Magda shook her head. A look of irritation crossed the man’s face, then he moved his right hand dismissively. ‘No matter. These things can be arranged in time. Now, what about your child’s father? Is he still on the scene?’
Magda tried to think what on earth to say, but failed miserably.
‘I thought not.’ The expression of unconcealed disdain for her child’s fatherless state silenced her even more than her inability to provide an answer under such circumstances. ‘But that is all to the good,’ he swept on. ‘He will not interfere.’
A dark glance swept over her, as if he were making some kind of final internal decision. ‘So, altogether, I can see no obstacles to what I propose—you are clearly extremely suitable.’
Panic struck Magda. He was sweeping ahead, dragging her along as if she were nothing more than a tin can rattling on a piece of string behind a racing car. She had to stop all this right now. It was too absurd for words.
‘Please,’ she cut in, ‘I’m not suitable at all, really. And I’m sorry, but I have to go now. I have other apartments to clean and I’m running late—’
She didn’t, this was the last one, but there was no need to let him know that.
His voice came silkily.
‘If you accept my proposition you will never clean another apartment in your life. For a woman of your background you will live in comfortable circumstances—if you are financially prudent—for several years simply on what I shall pay you for six months of your life.’
Emotions warred inside Magda. Uppermost was umbrage at the way he had said so disdainfully ‘a woman of your background’, as though she came from a different species of humanity. But beneath that, forcing its way to the surface, was something more powerful.
Temptation.
Comfortable circumstances…
The phrase jumped out at her. What on earth had the man said—something about a hundred thousand pounds? It couldn’t be true. The thought of so much money was beyond her. With a hundred thousand pounds she could move out of London, buy a flat, even a little house, stop having to depend on state income support, stop work, look after Benji properly…plan for the future.
For a moment, so intense that it hurt, she had a vision of herself and Benji in a nice little house somewhere, with a little garden, on a nice road, and nice families all around. Nothing spectacular, just normal and ordinary and…nice. Somewhere decent to bring him up. Somewhere that was a real home.
She saw herself in the kitchen, baking cakes, while she watched Benji tricycle round a little paved patio, with a swing-set on the lawn beyond, a cat snoozing on the windowsill, washing hanging on the line. With next-door neighbours who had children, and hung up their washing, and baked cakes. Who lived normal, ordinary lives.
An ache of longing so deep inside it made her feel weak swept through her.
Across the bar, Rafaello’s dark eyes narrowed. She was taking the bait; he could see. It had been hard work to get her to this point—far harder than he had envisaged. But at last she was responding.
And the more time and effort he put into persuading her, the more he was convinced she was perfect for the job.
Dio, but his father would be apoplectic! His son presenting him with a bride who had a fatherless kid in tow and who cleaned toilets for a living. Who looked as drab and plain as the back end of a bus. That would teach him to try and force his hand—
Magda saw the gleam of triumph in the obsidian eyes and quailed. She must be insane even to think of thinking about what he had offered her! A hundred thousand pounds—it was ridiculous. It was absurd. Almost as absurd as the notion of a female like her marrying a man like that…for whatever lunatic reason.
‘I really do have to go,’ she said with a rush, and got to her feet. As she did so she must have jogged Benji’s chair, because he gave a sudden start and woke up. Immediately he gave out a little wail. Magda stooped down and cupped his cheek. ‘It’s OK, Benji. Mum’s here.’
The wail stopped, and Benji reached out one of his little hands and patted her face.
