‘My personal entertaining tends to be impromptu and informal.’ The cottage couldn’t comfortably be used for large gatherings. Even the dining room that previous owners had carved from the original big old-fashioned kitchen didn’t have space for more than a table for six and a sideboard.
‘Tell me about this job of yours,’ Zito invited.
‘I started work with Leon’s catering firm soon after I arrived in Auckland, as casual labour. At first I was just serving food and laying tables, working lots of overtime…’ She’d needed the money. ‘After a couple of months he asked me to join the permanent staff.’
Leon had been impressed by her quickness, her reliability and her initiative. She remembered the inordinate thrill his praise had given her. ‘I could see,’ she went on, ‘that some clients would have liked more than food. Someone to organise invitations, publicity, venues—take care of the details of running a successful affair.’
‘You could see?’ Zito tilted his head.
That wasn’t disbelief, Roxane told herself. It’s just interest. Don’t be touchy.
‘Yes,’ she said firmly. ‘So I ran the idea past Leon and he said, “Let’s try it,” and put me in charge.’
‘Just like that.’
‘Just like that,’ she confirmed, and tried not to look smug. ‘I’m very good at what I do, and now I have the salary to prove it.’ Soon she would be able to afford new furniture and a few luxury items.
‘Congratulations.’
‘It’s small beer compared to the Riccioni empire, but so far we’re a roaring success.’
‘Deloras isn’t an empire, it’s a family business,’ Zito argued testily.
‘A family business worth millions.’ Maybe billions. She had never been privy to financial details.
‘That isn’t a crime. We all work very hard.’
‘I know you do.’ It was true of the men in the family anyway. The women weren’t expected to take part directly, as had been made very clear to her.
She was to keep house, which in practice meant ‘ordering’ a staff of three experienced people for a household of two, preside at parties and formal dinners for which the catering was performed by Deloras chefs and waiters, and attend functions that often seemed to have no other purpose than to allow the Deloras men to parade their success in the form of the clothes, jewels, beauty and breeding of their womenfolk.
At one of these extravaganzas, she’d complained to Zito that she felt about as useful as the magnificent carved ice centrepiece that graced the table before them. He’d smiled down at her and said, ‘You’re far more beautiful, and not nearly as cold.’
His eyes gleaming wickedly, he’d folded her into his arms and swung her onto the crowded area of polished floor where other couples were dancing under dimmed coloured lights to a slow, romantic tune.
Swaying rhythmically to the music, his cheek resting against her temple, he murmured to her reminders of the heat that they generated each time they came together as man and woman, his wonderfully sexy voice thickening as he described to her in explicit detail how she had reacted to him only the night before, how her responses had delighted him, how much he had enjoyed watching her total abandonment to pleasure. And what pleasure she had given him in return.
‘Zito, don’t!’ she’d finally begged him, embarrassed by the flush that burned in her cheeks, indeed over her entire body. ‘This is a public place.’
‘No one can hear,’ he assured her, bringing her even closer to him as he looked at her with glittering eyes. He had succeeded in arousing himself as much as he had her, she realised. His lips inches from hers, he said, ‘Shall we find somewhere private?’
She was trembling. ‘Here?’ The function was held in the ballroom of one of Melbourne’s historic houses. The whole ground floor was in use, and the upstairs region had been cordoned off.
‘Outside,’ Zito whispered. He leaned forward a little more, his lips barely touching hers for half a second. But instead of drawing away he bent to press another kiss to the smooth skin just behind the delicate silver and diamond pendant, one of his many exquisite gifts to her, that hung from her earlobe. The tip of his tongue traced the tiny groove, and every one of her nerve ends came alive.
Her teeth bit into her lip to stop a telltale moan escaping her throat, where her heart seemed to have lodged, a wave of sensation racing from the sensitive spot he’d teased, all the way to her toes, throbbing between her legs. For a horrifying moment she was afraid she would climax right there on the dance floor.
Pulling away, she looked at him with glazed eyes, her voice low and hoarse. ‘Find somewhere.’
Without a word he turned her, a hand on her waist just below the daringly dipped back of her bronze chiffon gown. He cut a ruthless swathe through the dancers and the chattering groups gathered at the edge of the room. Someone spoke to them and Roxane tried to smile in response, her facial muscles stiff, her cheekbones heated.
Zito curtly returned the greeting but didn’t slacken his stride, his arm sliding further about her waist and urging her forward.
Then he’d found a door and they were outside, where a few couples holding champagne flutes stood about on a narrow terrace lit by rows of coloured lightbulbs. It was cooler here, but not cold.
Zito didn’t hesitate, plunging down a shallow flight of steps and along a brick path that narrowed as it entered a darkened thicket of shrubs and trees. Behind them Roxane heard a woman laugh, a man rumble some remark.
‘Zito,’ she hissed. ‘People are going to guess what we’re—’
‘Let them.’
‘Zito…’ She made an effort to slow, stop.
Zito halted, both arms going about her. ‘Do you care?’ He kissed her quickly, thoroughly, his mouth covering hers, making her open it to him, his tongue feathering the roof of her mouth before withdrawing. His teeth gently nipped her lower lip.
‘No,’ she confessed recklessly, when he left her an inch between their mouths for her to reply.
Not speaking again, he propelled her further along the path, and they came on a small, unlit summerhouse. Inside Roxane saw the flutter of a light-coloured dress, heard a man’s slow voice and a whispered feminine answer.
Zito gave a smothered laugh and steered Roxane off the path between a couple of white-starred shrubs, the perfumed flowers brushing her arms and leaving a subtle sweet scent on her skin. They crossed a small moonlit lawn sheltered by surrounding growth, and under the shadow of a huge old tree he paused. The night was black here, the egg-shaped half moon that hung in the sky nearly obscured by leafy branches overhead.
He kissed her again, long and deep, and his fingers found the short zipper of her dress. It was the sort of dress that didn’t allow a bra, and when he slid it from her shoulders it fell about her feet.
Roxane gasped, and Zito bent, one hand still on her body, skimming down her back, and picked up the light, flimsy thing to drape it over a nearby
