nodded. ‘I love his work. It’s mad and witty and so clever. I could look at it for hours.’
‘This is only a reproduction but my home in Florence has a couple of his original pieces.’
A tiny shiver traced up her spine at the mention of Florence. Italy was her home. It was where Gabriele was from. Their respective families’ lives had been turned into a soap opera there and she dreaded the reception that news of their marriage would bring in their home country.
‘Are you going to change?’ he asked. ‘We need to leave soon.’
‘I have changed.’
‘You’re not intending to go out like that?’ The approval had gone.
Turning her gaze from the painting, she looked at him and saw disbelief on his face.
‘What’s wrong with it?’ Having only packed for the weekend, she’d opted for the clothes she’d intended to travel back to Europe in: a navy-blue trouser suit with a high-necked white blouse and a pair of flat black shoes.
‘You look like you’re going to a business meeting. Have you anything else to wear? Anything remotely feminine?’
Bristling, she scowled. ‘This is what I feel comfortable in. All my clothes are the same—trouser suits.’
‘And when you’re not working?’
She shrugged. ‘Clothes don’t interest me.’
‘They do now,’ he stated grimly. ‘Stand still a minute.’
Burning under the weight of his scrutiny, she nonetheless held her head high, wondering what the big deal was. Clothes were clothes. They were worn to protect you from the elements and, in a business environment, to convey a professional approach. Everything else was superfluous.
‘Untuck your blouse,’ he ordered.
She did as he said, wondering what he was thinking.
‘Now tie it into a knot around your waist.’
At her puzzled look, he sighed and reached for the base of her blouse, undoing the bottom two buttons.
‘What are you doing?’ she demanded, stepping back, unnerved.
‘Unsmartening you. Now tie it into a knot and undo the top three buttons—unless you want me to do it for you?’
‘Touch me again and I’ll punch you in the nose.’
He raised his eyebrows but his tone remained civil. ‘We’re going out in public in a few minutes. You have to be comfortable with my touch if we’re going to convince your father and the world that we’ve fallen madly in love.’
‘I doubt a decade of marriage would make me comfortable with a man who wants to destroy my family.’ And he absolutely could destroy them. It was the only reason she stood there taking this humiliation.
‘Fake it.’
As he was looming so threateningly over her, she quickly did as he bid. Feeling like a complete fool, she unbuttoned her blouse. ‘Anything else you want me to do? Get a face transplant?’
‘You could do with a damn good haircut but seeing as we don’t have time for that either tie it into a knot or wear it down. Ponytails are for schoolgirls. And tug your trousers down so they sit on your hips and not around your belly button.’
When she was done and had retied her hair into his requested knot, she put her hands on her hips. ‘Am I presentable now?’
‘Roll your trousers up a couple of inches.’
If she glared at him any more there was a good chance the wind would change direction and her face would stay that way.
Crouching down, she rolled her trousers up so they hung above her ankles.
‘Have you any other shoes?’ he asked when she was upright again.
‘I have a pair of running shoes.’
He pulled a face. ‘Then you will have to do as you are but first thing in the morning, we’re going clothes shopping.’
‘You do not get to choose my wardrobe.’
‘I wouldn’t think it necessary if you didn’t have such dire taste. You dress like a straitjacketed man.’
‘I do not.’
‘You don’t dress like a woman. Personally I couldn’t care less what you wear,’ he continued, speaking over her indignant yelp of protest, ‘but the fact is you’re supposed to be a woman in love. Women in love take pride in their appearance and the clothes they wear.’
‘Do they?’
‘They do.’ A look of suspicion crossed his features. When he next spoke, it was with a hint of hesitation. ‘You have been in a relationship before?’
‘I’m twenty-five,’ she scoffed, evading the question, damned if she was going to admit she hadn’t even been on a date before. It was none of his business.
Even if she had been so inclined, there hadn’t been any chance of boyfriends growing up, what with a solo education and three ready-made chaperones in the form of her brothers. By the time she was old enough to ditch the chaperones, she’d sworn off men for life. She knew everything there was to know about them and how they and their friends treated the women in their lives and spoke behind their backs. They were pigs. All men were.
Maybe she was being unkind to pigs.
‘If I don’t feel comfortable in what I’m wearing it will be harder for me to pretend to be in love,’ she pointed out.
She was glad she’d thought of her brothers and the idiots they called friends. If she pretended Gabriele was one of them she could handle him without any problem whatsoever. They didn’t unnerve her or threaten to overwhelm her with their latent masculinity as Gabriele did.
‘You can choose your clothes but you will burn your existing wardrobe.’
‘I’ll put it in storage for the day we go our separate ways.’
‘You know what you’ll have to do to make that day come closer.’
More colour crept over her face but she didn’t drop her gaze. ‘Or maybe you’ll get so sick of living with me that you end it before a baby’s conceived.’
He shrugged a hefty shoulder and leaned forward, his eyes drilling into her. ‘I spent two years in prison for a crime I didn’t commit. In that time my father died and my mother’s health deteriorated. Every day we spend together is another day of purgatory for your father. I have no time limit.’
For the first time a whisper of doubt blew at her.
Could he be telling the truth?
She discounted it as soon as she thought it. Her brothers might be pigs but
