laughter washed over her and she felt like she’d found her place here. And that was very dangerous thinking, because if she belonged with Marco, then what was she going to do when she had to leave him again?
Six
Marco woke in the middle of the night and sat bolt upright in his bed. The voice of his grandfather echoed in his mind, saying something about being too late.
Marco scrubbed a hand over his face and reached for the light on the nightstand, flicking it on before he remembered he wasn’t alone. Virginia.
She was really here. After they’d made love she’d fallen asleep in his arms. And he hadn’t minded. Because the last thing he’d wanted to do was question her when he felt so vulnerable. Damned if this woman didn’t make him feel…weak.
Well, out of control. Like he had the very first time he’d gotten behind the wheel of a Moretti F1 racing machine. Virginia lay curled on her side facing him, one of her hands reaching toward him, the other curled under her chin.
Asleep, he could study her without having to admit to anyone that he was obsessed with her. He knew that Dominic had been particularly glad when they’d met that morning in Melbourne and Virginia hadn’t been with him.
Had his brother seen something in Virginia that had made him wary of the attraction she had for Marco? Or was it simply Dom’s normal fear that a woman would distract him from the quest to take Moretti Motors to the top?
It wasn’t like Marco was ever really alone. There were always beautiful women who were more than willing to hang on his arm and go back to his place for a night. What had been different with Virginia? Or had it been his reaction that had made Dom more watchful?
Marco didn’t know if he and his brothers had made a wise decision when they’d vowed to avoid women who could make them feel. Marco couldn’t speak for his brothers, but he was tired of the emotional wasteland that was his past relationships.
He let no one close to him. And at the end of the day, he was alone. Of course he had his brothers, and together the Morettis were strong—but there were times when he longed for the happiness his father had found with his mother.
The kind of happiness that stemmed from love. He shook his head to clear it. He wasn’t the kind of man who needed love. He needed a powerful engine under his control. He needed the thrill of pitting himself against the other top race car drivers in the world. But love? He didn’t need that.
He pushed himself out of the bed and flicked off the light so he wouldn’t disturb Virginia.
Why did she make him feel? He was thirty-six years old and he had a good life. Why was he suddenly asking questions and looking harder at the choices and decisions he’d made?
He walked to the wet bar and poured himself a Di Saronno. He tossed the drink back and walked around the darkened living room. The lights of Barcelona competed with the stars in the sky. He’d like to blame his restlessness on Virginia and the questions he still hadn’t asked her, but he knew it was more than that.
He leaned against the French doors, staring out at the night sky over Barcelona. It was quiet now, and he had the feeling that he was alone in the world. His thoughts swirled and he realized that winning the Grand Prix World Championship this year wasn’t going to be enough for him. Because once he had another championship under his belt, there would be nothing left for him in the world of Formula One racing.
He felt sometimes as if he didn’t know who he was if he wasn’t behind the wheel of a race car. Being the face of Moretti Motors was fine, but that wasn’t much of a career. And to be honest with himself, he’d known he’d always been a little bit embarrassed by the way women flocked to him and photographers sought him out.
He walked back to the bar and refilled his glass again.
“Marco?”
He turned to see Virginia standing in the shadows of the hallway.
“Sì?”
“What are you doing?”
“I could not sleep. Did I disturb you?”
She walked toward him and he saw that she wore his shirt. He liked the way she looked in his clothes. When she was close enough, he reached out and pulled her closer, tucking her head under his chin and simply holding her.
“What are you thinking about? The race earlier?”
He was tempted to say yes. It would be easy to say that he was rerunning the race and trying to figure out when he’d lost, but his mind wasn’t on Formula One or even Moretti Motors. It was on this woman.
“No. I’m not dwelling on the race.”
“What then?” she asked, pulling back to look up at him.
“I was thinking that I don’t know your last name or what you do for a living. Yet, you know what my mother’s career is and a million other details of my life.”
She flushed. “Is that important to you?”
“Yes,” he said. “It is.”
She hesitated. Then, “I’m Virginia Festa. I was born in Italy, but moved to America when I was a year old. My mother, Carmen Festa, was a schoolteacher.”
“What about your father?”
“I never knew him. He died before I was born.”
The name Festa sounded familiar to him. “Where in Italy were you born?”
“In Chivasso.”
He stiffened. That was where Cassia had been from. The woman who’d cursed his grandfather and by default all of the Moretti men. He had no idea what the old witch’s surname was, because his grandfather always just referred to her as that witch. But there was something about hearing the tale of Virginia’s life that put him in mind of his own family’s curse. He hadn’t believed in the curse until Dom’s doomed love affair. That had been the incident that had made both him and Antonio consider what their nonno
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