it would be Angelina who got hurt, not him.
He’d been falling in love with his wife when she’d left, his instincts warning him if he let himself, he would have fallen harder for Angelina than he had ever fallen for Lucia. His love for Lucia had been a pure, untainted first love that lacked the passion and emotion he and Angelina had shared. The depth of his feelings for Angelina, the betrayal those feelings had seemed to Lucia, the youth and unhappiness Angelina had displayed that had made her an unsure bet, had made him cauterize his feelings, refuse to acknowledge them.
And his instincts had been dead-on, he thought, staring up at the cloudy night sky. Angelina had walked out as soon as the going had gotten tough, had made a mockery of the vows they’d made. And that was why certain lines could never be crossed.
If he was smart, he would follow his original plan. Burn out the attraction between him and his wife until it no longer held any power over him.
Now that he had her back in his bed, he intended to do exactly that.
“HOW ABOUT YOU come to Mallorca in a couple of weeks? I have to be at our flagship property for a few days. You can meet with the management team and we can go through the last few points face-to-face.”
Lorenzo blew out a breath. He’d spent two weeks anticipating Marc Bavaro’s return from South America and now he wanted him to gallivant off to Spain, Belmont’s global headquarters, to make this deal happen? He ran a global corporation, for God’s sake, three times the size of Bavaro’s. How the hell did he have time for that?
“As much as I’d love to,” he said in an even tone, “my schedule is insane. We can’t do it before then?”
“I’m headed to London as we speak. I’m not back to New York until mid-October.”
Too late, with the board meeting looming. “I’ll see what I can do,” Lorenzo conceded. “How long are you thinking?”
“Come for a couple of days. We can have dinner with my brother, Diego, the night you arrive, then we’ll do the management meeting the next morning. Oh—” the CEO’s voice dropped to an intimate purr “—and bring your beautiful wife...she can keep Penny company.”
He wasn’t sure Bavaro lusting after Angelina was going to go over so well in his current mood. “Angie is in her busy period. I’ll have to check her schedule.”
“Let me know.” The roar of a jet engine fired in the background. “I should go.”
He cut off the call. Turned the air blue. Gillian popped her head in his office and asked if he needed help. He told her to clear his schedule for the time in Mallorca, then turned his thoughts to his wife. How to get her to agree to go to Spain was the challenge. She was so busy with commissions after Faggini’s show she’d even hired a couple of part-time designers to help with the rush. She would balk at a trip, no doubt about it.
He sat back in his chair and contemplated a solution. Things had been better than good between them. They were learning to compromise, to manage their expectations of each other. They were communicating both in bed and out of it. His marriage was working. The last thing he needed was to rock the boat.
But this, he thought, tapping his fingers on the desk, was necessary.
A plan came to him. It was a good one. Satisfied, he picked up the phone.
* * *
“I have a proposal for you.”
Angelina cradled her mobile against her ear as she put down her pliers, the intimate, seductive edge to her husband’s voice unleashing a wave of heat beneath her skin. The huskiness, she knew, came from the inhuman working hours he was keeping.
“If it involves sleep for you, I’m all for it,” she said lightly. “What time were you up this morning?”
“Five. And, yes, it involves sleep for both of us,” he replied in a throaty tone that sent goose bumps to her heated skin. “Well,” he amended, “it involves a bed and us. Sleep not so much.”
Her heart beat a jagged rhythm. They hadn’t been able to get enough of each other since Alexander’s party, thus contributing to her sleeping deficit. Not that she was complaining. She was so happy she was afraid to blink, because history had taught her something would implode in her face if she did.
But she wasn’t thinking that way, she reminded herself. “What are you proposing?”
“The only way I can pin Marc Bavaro down is to hook up with him at his property in Mallorca in a couple of weeks’ time. Penny’s going. He wants you to come, too.”
She pressed a palm to her temple. “Lorenzo... I have so much work to do before Christmas.”
“That’s part of my proposal. You come with me to Spain and I will absolve you of any social obligations until the hotel opening in October.”
“What are you going to do? Go to them alone?”
“Sì.”
She didn’t like the idea of her gorgeous husband attending all those events alone the way women fell all over him. Leaving the country for a week was also an unwise idea given the work in front of her.
But how could she say no after everything Lorenzo had done for her? He had been her rock as she’d navigated her emotional visits with her mother, pushed her to hire a couple of assistants to keep her sanity with all the work pouring in. And when she was exhausted from managing them, he deposited her bodily into bed when she no longer recognized her limits. She wasn’t sure what she would have done without him.
“I will take you to Portofino for a couple of days afterward.” Her husband’s voice lowered to a sexy rasp. “We can do walks through the village. I’ll take you to that seafood restaurant you love...”
Her heart turned over. By far her most magical memories with Lorenzo were from that heavenly week they’d spent together in the tiny fishing village on the Italian Riviera on their honeymoon, the view from the Riccis’ villa perched in the hills spectacularly romantic. It had been impossibly perfect with their strolls through the cobblestone streets, leisurely, seaside dinners and long, uninhibited nights of lovemaking in which her husband had taught her wicked things, delicious things her innocent mind could only have dreamed of.
Going back would be like walking into a piece of the past she wasn’t sure she was ready for, but perhaps that was exactly what she needed to do.
“Well?” her husband prompted. “Say yes. It will be good for us, cara.”
She blew out a breath. “Okay. But I can’t be gone longer than a week. And I’m holding you to your promise.”
“Bene.” Satisfaction laced his tone. “I’ll get Gillian to work with you on the details. Grazie mille, bella. I should go.”
She hung up. Stared at all the pieces on her desk that needed to be finished. Thought of the massive influx of orders to be filled. She was a tiny operation—she wasn’t built for this.
Panic clawed
