invited you here for one reason only. You could be of use to me. I need a woman to play a role. A woman I can trust to play that role to the best of her ability and do exactly as she’s told. And I think that that woman could be you—’
Her lashes fluttered in bemusement. ‘I don’t think I follow.’
‘If you are prepared to place yourself without question in my hands for a period, not exceeding three months, I will consider treating your father’s offence with sympathy, understanding and forgiveness...’ Carlo stated quietly.
Sympathy, understanding and forgiveness. Alien emotions where Carlo was concerned. Her temples were throbbing. Her concentration was blown. She studied him with perceptible incomprehension, temporarily drained of all emotion. She just didn’t know what he was talking about.
‘This role,’ Carlo selected smoothly, letting champagne froth down into another glass. ‘It would entail considerable intimacy—’
‘Intimacy?’ she whispered shakily.
Carlo slotted the glass into her nerveless fingers. He surveyed her with immense satisfaction. ‘Intimacy,’ he repeated lazily, making a sexual banquet of the word and the long-drawn-out syllables were like a set of taunting fingers on her spine.
‘What... what exactly are you offering me?’ Jessica framed jerkily.
‘You would have to agree before I told you the details.’ Carlo dealt her a cool, steady glance, silky black lashes low over hooded, very dark eyes.
‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘Unusual.’ Carlo shifted a broad shoulder in a slight shrug. ‘But I don’t trust you. Why should I? And it is not as though you have moral scruples, is it? And even if you had,’ he pointed out, ‘you do have your father to consider.’
She tensed, forcing herself to concentrate. ‘Are you talking about some kind of job?’
Carlo’s mouth curved wryly. ‘You could call it that.’ ‘And would it entail breaking the law?’ she prompter flatly.
‘What do you take me for, cara?’
‘Would it?’ she persisted.
‘No.’
Jessica cleared her throat. ‘You mentioned intimacy... were you talking about sexual intimacy?’ she pursued, tight-lipped and rigid. ‘Or was that just your idea of a joke?’
His strong jawline hardened. ‘There would be nothing remotely humorous about the exercise, that I can assure you. And yes, I was referring to sexual intimacy. The part you would play would not be credible without it.’
Dear heaven, why was she actually standing here listening to this nonsense? Her oval face set with distaste and rejection as her imagination ran absolutely rampant. Was he suggesting that she become some sort of business spy, sleeping with some competitor to gain information? An insane idea, but why else the secrecy? A kind of job that would last no longer than three months which would entail sex. How utterly revolting! A hysterical laugh clogged up her throat though. Her level of sexual experience lifted such a proposition to the heights of a tragicomic black joke...but then Carlo was not to know that.
Jessica threw back her shoulders. ‘Clearly you need a hooker
‘Madre di Dio...what are you saying to me?’ Carlo shot her a black glance of naked hauteur. ‘Are you crazy? I need a woman who can at the very least behave like a lady—’
‘And you don’t know any?’ Jessica cut in. ‘Now why doesn’t that surprise me? And how many beds are you expecting this lady to climb into at your request?’
Dark golden eyes narrowed. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
Jessica reddened, suddenly uncertain.
‘The only bed you would be expected to warm would be mine,’ Carlo spelt out very drily.
Jessica went white and looked back at him in disbelief. Setting down the untouched champagne, she reached for her coat with an unsteady hand. ‘Quite out of the question,’ she told him with bitter clarity. ‘I have no intention of selling my body to keep my father out of prison! Why the cloak and dagger approach, Carlo? Couldn’t you just have asked me to be your mistress? Well, the answer is no... no, no, no! I’d sooner take to the streets!’
Brilliant dark eyes raked over her impassively. ‘Go, then ... I have nothing more to say to you.’
‘But I’m not finished yet,’ Jessica asserted with venom. ‘Six years ago, you came into my life like a dark shadow and you tried to destroy it. There is no human being alive whom I hate more than you! And why did you set out to wreck my life? Out of nothing more than overweening conceit, selfishness and lust. It didn’t matter to you that I was engaged to another man or that I loved that man. It didn’t matter that you might hurt him as much as you hurt me.’
‘You hurt him, not I,’ Carlo returned without emotion. Jessica shuddered with the force of her own teeming emotions. ‘You set out to ruin our relationship—’
‘If you had truly loved him, I would have been without power. The power I had you gave me...’
Hot pink flushed her slanted cheekbones. ‘I did not!’
‘With every look, every breath you took in my radius. Your hunger drew me,’ Carlo condemned without conscience.
‘No!’ She stared back at him in stark distress and reproach, her father’s plight forgotten as he plunged her back into the past, heaping her with more guilt and an even greater sense-of responsibility for all that had gone wrong.
‘Did it give your ego a kick?’ Carlo sent her a look of blazing contempt. ‘You play with fire, you get burnt, cara:
Jessica’s knees felt like cotton wool. She was shattered by Carlo’s view of what had happened between them. He was accusing her of having encouraged him when she had fought his ruthless pursuit every step of the way. Only at the last when she was at the very end of her strength had she failed.
‘I came here and I shouldn’t have come.’ White and drawn, she turned away. ‘We hate each other, Carlo. I don’t think you realise the extent of the damage you did six years ago and I expect that even if you did you wouldn’t care—’
‘You walked away from me..
And it was still there, an intensity of disbelief and banked-down fury. She couldn’t understand the strength of his emotion after all this time. It wasn’t as though Carlo Saracini had fallen in love with her. Right from the beginning, it had been a rawly sexual wanting on his side. The way he looked at her, the way he touched her, the way he talked to her. Predator and victim. Passion and pain. That was what he had offered her. And she hadn’t walked away... she had run as if the hounds of hell were on her tail.
‘I still don’t think I deserve the offer you just made,’ Jessica breathed not quite steadily. ‘You sit there in your ivory tower, wrapped in all your money, and you have the sensitivity of a butcher where feelings are concerned.’ Tears stung her amethyst eyes but she held her head proudly high.
‘That is a gross untruth,’ Carlo slashed back
