off,’ she answered. ‘He never mentioned anything to me about a visitor coming and neither did Lucia, the housekeeper, who often kept an eye on him for me while I was doing errands.’
Rafaele wondered whether or not to believe her. She was certainly very convincing with her soft grey-blue eyes misting slightly as if she had genuinely been fond of his father. But how could he be sure? She had made all but a token protest about marrying him in order to gain her share of the estate, and even more damning was the scandal over her previous client back in Australia. He had looked up the newspaper articles on the Internet and read the various interviews with the family members, who had each painted Emma March as an opportunist who had inveigled her way into their senile mother’s affections before stealing from her. That the charges were later dropped hadn’t satisfied the family, who still staunchly believed Emma to have used the old woman’s dementia to throw doubt on the case.
As he saw it, Emma was either a genuinely caring person who had become the unfortunate victim of a hate campaign by jealous relatives, or she was indeed a conniving con-artist with greed as her motive.
It sickened him to think of her playing up to his father to manipulate him into changing his will in her favour at the last hour. The thought of her firm young body being pawed over by a ruthless old man like his father churned his stomach. But then he already knew how far a woman would go for money. The mistress his father had kept after Giovanni had died, Sondra Henning, was a case in point. Thirty-odd years his father’s junior she had made no effort to hide her intentions. She had been a spiteful bitch when his father wasn’t looking. She had subjected Rafaele to the lash of her tongue and the slap of her hand. He couldn’t bear the thought of that home-wrecker taking anything else away from him.
Emma March might be a ruthless little gold-digger, but she had a sensual aura about her that was potently seductive. She wasn’t classically beautiful by any means, but there was something about her girl-next-door vitality that drew him in like a magnet. Every time he touched her he felt the electrifying voltage of her body charging into his. Her slim but femininely curvy body made him ache to feel her writhing beneath him in the throes of passion. He wanted to feel his hard, thickened body driving into the yielding softness of hers until they both exploded. He wanted to feel her primly pursed mouth sucking on him until he burst with pleasure. He wanted to taste her, to explore her tender contours and bring her to the pinnacle of fulfilment he knew she craved. He had seen it in her eyes almost from the first moment they had met. That hungry, yearning look was unmistakable.
‘It has all worked out rather brilliantly for you, has it not, Emma?’ he asked. ‘All your hard work has paid off. Either way you win.’
She looked at him hesitantly. ‘I’m not sure what you mean…’
He smiled a cynical smile. ‘You have a roof over your head for the duration of our marriage and a guaranteed income at the end of it, a windfall most people would not dream of seeing in a lifetime.’
‘I keep telling you I was never interested in your father’s money,’ she said. ‘As far as I can make out he apparently wanted you to spend some time at The Villa Fiorenza and the only way he thought he could bring it about was to tie you here with me.’
Rafaele snapped his brows together. ‘This villa has been in the Fiorenza family for several generations. I spent some of the happiest years of my life in this place before my mother and brother died. I will be damned if I will let one of my father’s whores take even a single pebble from the driveway without my permission.’
‘I’m not planning on making things unpleasant or difficult for you,’ she said. ‘You can live your life and I’ll live mine. We don’t even have to communicate with each other if we don’t want to.’
‘Your very presence here makes things difficult,’ Rafaele muttered as he set his glass down with a loud thwack. ‘But perhaps that is what you and my father planned.’
She frowned at him. ‘I’m not sure what you’re suggesting, but I can assure you I am finding this as difficult if not more so than you. The sooner we end this farce, the better, as far as I am concerned.’ With one last searing glance, she stalked out, leaving him with just his empty glass for company.
AFTER their exchange Emma did her best to avoid Rafaele, although at one point she watched him from her upstairs window as he swam lap after lap in the pool, his strong, leanly muscled body carving through the water with effortless ease. She felt a little guilty drinking in the sight of him, but she couldn’t seem to drag her eyes away. His body was so wonderfully built; lean but powerful, muscular without being over-bulky. His olive skin was a deep even brown as if he had recently spent some time somewhere tropical. His black hair was like wet silk as he vaulted out of the water, the water droplets on his body glistening in the afternoon sun. As he reached for his towel he looked up and locked gazes with her, the lazy smile he sent her seeming to suggest he had known all along she was up there staring down at him.
Emma turned from the window with her heart doing little back flips in her chest, her face hot and her pulse racing out of control. She was deeply ashamed of her reaction to him. She felt like a gauche schoolgirl instead of a grown woman. He had only to look at her and she felt her colour begin to rise both inside and out. That dark smouldering gaze of his set her senses alight every time it rested on her and it seemed there was nothing she could do to stop it. It galled her to think he of all people had such an effect on her. He was an unprincipled playboy, a man who used women as playthings, discarding them when they no longer appealed to him. She knew if she was fool enough to succumb to his potent charm he would break her heart and think nothing of it. After all it would be the perfect revenge to get back at her for what he was convinced she had done to profit from his father’s will.
The new housekeeper came to work at the villa each morning, along with the team of gardeners, which left Emma with even less to do to occupy her time. She caught up on some reading and went for long walks about the town, visiting some of the places she had read about in her travel guide. The tourist season was in full swing by now and she mingled with the crowds, stopping for coffee at one of the many cafes until the heat of the day brought her back to the villa.
After a few days, once the staff had left for the day Emma made the most of the warm weather by dipping in and out of the pool. The water was cool against her heated skin and she closed her eyes and floated on her back, enjoying the sounds of the garden, the birds twittering in the shrubs and trees, the gentle lap of water and the soothing tinkle of the wind chimes hanging in the arbour.
‘Mind if I join you?’ Rafaele’s deep voice sounded from the deck of the pool.
Emma jerked upright, water shooting up her nose as she tried to find her feet. ‘You scared me!’ she said, blinking the water out of her eyes. ‘I thought you’d gone out.’
‘I did, but I have been back about an hour,’ he said. ‘I thought I might find you out here. How is the water?’
‘It’s…lovely,’ she said, trying not to stare at his leanly muscled body. He was dressed in black bathers, the close-fitting Lycra outlining his masculine form so lovingly she felt her breath hitch in her throat.
He dived in and swam several lengths, the effortless motion of his arms and legs making Emma’s earlier efforts seem rather pathetic by comparison.
‘Want a race to the other end?’ he asked as he came up close by.
‘I’m not quite in your league,’ she said with a self-conscious grimace.
‘Come
