be ready for a showdown with him?’
An astute question, and a painful one, because she had considered and accepted only this morning that she wasn’t ready for any kind of showdown with Marco. Now here she was, standing on the very threshold of one hell of a row—and in a room packed full of his loyal supporters.
Cuckoo in the nest didn’t even cover what she suddenly began to feel like.
‘Be brave, my friend,’ Stefan softly encouraged. Then—‘Good evening, Marco.’ He smiled. ‘It’s a pleasure to see you again…’
But it wasn’t a pleasure for any of them. Standing close to Stefan still, Antonia was assailed by the familiar scent of Marco before she was assailed by the full impact of his physical presence. He arrived at her side, his shoulder level with her chin. As usual her skin began to shimmer at the near contact, her fingers curling tensely round the glass while she waited for him to say something totally unforgivable.
Yet all he did was offer Stefan his hand to shake and return the polite greeting without any obvious sign of animosity. ‘You’re showing at Romano’s all next week, I believe.’ As smoothly as that, Marco informed Antonia that he had known Stefan was here in Milan but had not bothered to tell her.
‘The doors open on Saturday,’ Stefan confirmed. ‘I was just asking Antonia if you were both coming to my private viewing on Friday evening,’ he added, with lying ease.
‘And of course she assured you that we wouldn’t miss it,’ Marco returned in the same lying vein.
‘Of course,’ Stefan smoothly confirmed. ‘Especially when I told her I have something for her to collect from me while she’s there.’ The smile at her puzzled frown and the teasing brush of a finger to her jutting chin were done, she was sure, simply to annoy Marco. ‘Let’s call it a belated birthday surprise,’ he suggested. ‘If you still have my Mirror Woman, Marco, then it may have some interest to you too,’ he added lightly.
It was a baited hook.
‘Sounds intriguing.’ Marco smiled, but Antonia stiffened at the mention of the painting that had given Stefan his fame—and herself her notoriety.
She had only seen it once since the first evening she had arrived in Marco’s apartment a year ago. The painting had been hanging in his study. When he’d shown it to her she hadn’t been able to hide her dismay, because she hadn’t realised that Marco actually owned the painting.
Marco had since moved it to a secure room connected to the study where he kept his more—personal investments.
Now Stefan was implying that he had another one just like it. And though she knew he was quite capable of producing a hundred paintings exactly the same, without needing the live model to do it, it disturbed her deeply to hear Stefan taunting Marco with the suggestion that he had returned to putting her in his paintings. Which led her straight to another question that set her trembling a little as she looked into his lean smooth indolently smiling face.
Had Stefan gone back on his promise to her?
Her eyes begged the question but Stefan refused to notice. Beside her Marco was playing it so casual she wondered if he even cared. But then, if she was on her way out, why should he care? she then asked herself. And, like this morning, she simply turned and walked away, with no stomach to play this game.
Only this time Marco didn’t let her get far before his hand was capturing one of hers. She tried to tug free.
‘Stop it,’ he said, turning her round until he could see her face. Her eyes were too dark, her cheeks too pale, and her soft mouth was trembling. Marco knew the look, he knew she was hurting, but the knowledge that it wasn’t him who had done the hurting this time didn’t help to lighten his mood one little bit.
One part of him wanted to beat the hell out of Kranst for being so insensitive as to mention the Mirror Woman, when Marco was sure he must know the way it could upset her. While another part wanted to blast her to smithereens for still being so vulnerable to something she had, after all, posed for in all her naked glory!
‘You reap what you sow, cara,’ he told her grimly, took the glass from her fingers and put it aside, then pulled her the few steps needed to bring them onto the dance floor and folded her into his arms. ‘Now dance,’ he commanded, holding her close even while she tried to strain away from him. ‘Remember where you are and who you will be hurting if you cause a scene here.’
As if on cue, Franco and Nicola danced in close to them. ‘Ciao,’ Nicola greeted awkwardly. ‘You two enjoying yourselves?’
She had to know that enjoyment was the last thing either he or Antonia were experiencing. ‘We’re having a wonderful time,’ Antonia answered smilingly, coiling an intimate hand around Marco’s neck—and dug her nails in. ‘I love it when Marco comes over all macho.’
Franco flashed him a sardonic look, Nicola avoided eye contact completely. ‘So long as you’re happy,’ their poor hostess mumbled, and looked relieved when her husband manoeuvred them away again.
‘She hates scenes,’ Marco sighed. ‘She always has done.’
‘I hate you,’ Antonia responded. ‘Does that mean I get a sympathetic sigh too?’
One part of him wanted to grin, the other part was furious. ‘No,’ he retaliated. ‘You get to go home with the guy you hate and receive your just reward in private.’
With that he reached up and unclipped her nails, held onto the hand and trapped it between their bodies. ‘Now look at me and smile,’ he gritted. ‘Or I think I might just kiss you senseless.’
If he expected the threat to subdue her, he soon learned otherwise when she had the absolute audacity to pull out one of her secret weapons that she kept under wraps for most of the time. Her head tipped backwards, her eyes grew sultry, and, setting the pink tip of her tongue between her even white teeth, she snaked up on her toe-tips and licked the thin line of his angry mouth.
Fire engulfed his body at the speed of lightning. Erogenous zones came alive with an urgency that stung.
Had she kissed Kranst like this? Made him feel like this?
Madre di Dio, he couldn’t deal with the green streak of furious jealousy that went rampaging through him. ‘We’re leaving,’ he announced.
‘I want to stay,’ she pouted, playing the seductress for all she was worth now, with sensual eyes and promising mouth and the inviting sway of her beautiful body.
In one corner of his consciousness he was totally engrossed in her, loving it—loving her defiance, her willingness to take him on, her deliberate public seduction. But another part was wondering if Kranst had incited this. With the flat of an angry palm pressed to her lower body he felt the smoothness of naked flesh beneath the clinging red fabric, and remembered Kranst’s hand grazing the same area.
She quivered for him. Had she quivered for Kranst? From the periphery of his vision he could see Kranst standing there watching them. He felt a bloody black fury begin to throb with his heartbeat, and he bit out silkily, ‘I’m game if you are.’
Lips gone so dry they were fused together, Antonia felt the sheer heat of that challenge burn right down to her tingling toes. In any mood Marco was a breathtaking study of
