emerald-green strapless gown she had been wearing at that party which, with no long-standing boyfriend to accompany her, she had chosen to attend alone. That still hadn’t stopped her from feeling immensely relieved when another guest had finally claimed the Romeo’s company.
Her sudden isolation, however, had left her exposed to the gaze of a man she hadn’t known then was Emiliano Cannavaro, although she had sensed him watching her for most of the time that she had been suffering the older man’s unwelcome attention.
With a clear field between them after the banker had moved away, Lauren had been unable to avoid meeting the cool intensity of his midnight-dark eyes.
He must have been around thirty then and was, from his tanned skin and thick black hair that flopped forward at the temples, like a number of the guests, unmistakably Italian. Yet, in this man she hadn’t known, Lauren had sensed an air of cool detachment and authority that had set him apart from the rest. Perhaps it had been that autocratic nose and the way that intensely dark shadow around his jaw had added something to its angular strength that had given her the notion that he wasn’t a man to be messed with. Or perhaps it had been that restless quality about him and the rather bored suggestion that he would rather have been somewhere else. But what he had had was presence. And it had been nothing less than spell-binding! Add that impression of straining muscle beneath the constraints of his dark tailored evening suit and Lauren had realised why every woman who had passed within ten yards of him seemed to fall over herself with the need to be noticed by him. And he hadn’t taken his eyes off her once!
Unused to being studied with such blatant interest, Lauren had looked quickly away to where the reed-slim blonde with the baby doll face and her far too handsome groom-to-be had been standing by the buffet tables with their arms interlinked in front of them, sipping from tall flutes of champagne.
‘Is that envy I see in your eyes? Or are you wondering, as I suspect you are, whether they are as happy as their animated laughter suggests?’
The heavily accented voice at her shoulder made every nerve sharpen in Lauren’s body, causing her fingers to tighten around the stem of her own glass. But it was the way its rich tones washed over her like a warm wave that had her catching her breath as though she had been submerged beneath the power of its sensuality.
‘Why shouldn’t they be happy?’ The effect of his nearness produced her unusually curt rejoinder. Nevertheless, her eyes challenged his, even though she knew her cheeks were probably as red as her swept-up hair that the woman in the store where she had bought her gown a few days ago had said would complement the emerald creation superbly.
‘Why, indeed?’ Up close, he looked even more stupendous than he had from a distance. His features were strong with clearly defined cheekbones, and his mouth, she recognised at once, had a hard-edged sensuality that could probably drive most nubile women mindless just from the promise of its unquestionable passion. His winged collar looked stark white against the hard bronze of his skin and he smelled good too, of some subtle masculine cologne that Lauren wanted to inhale—and keep on inhaling—until her suddenly starved senses were full of him. ‘She must have something very special to have brought Angelo Cannavaro to heel.’
Unaware that he was the brother of her sister’s fiancé, it was the fact that he was obviously acquainted with the groom’s playboy reputation that prompted Lauren to ask, ‘Are you a friend of the family?’
That passionate mouth of his twitched slightly before he said, ‘I would not exactly...call myself that.’
A business associate then, she speculated silently, and wondered, as she still did, at the reason for that definite hesitation in the way he said it.
A burst of laughter brought her attention to the couple, who were twirling to imaginary music with their arms still linked, champagne flutes still held high.
‘She strikes me as a young woman who knows what she wants and exactly how to get it.’
The man’s gaze was resting on the obvious mound of Vikki’s middle beneath the smoky blue satin of an outrageously low-cut, backless dress, split almost from hip to hem. But the critical note in his voice made Lauren bristle and look up at his devastating profile with narrowing eyes. ‘What are you implying, exactly?’
His thick hair gleamed darkly as he turned back to her again. ‘No implication, I assure you. But she must obviously be aware that there are worse fates than linking up with one of Italy’s oldest and most...significant families.’
Lauren’s hackles continued to rise. ‘And there are some who might say she could do better than marry into a family which has put too much emphasis on making money at the expense of investing the right kind of values in its offspring.’
Her piqued rejoinder brought a speculative curve to his mouth. ‘With you being one of them, I suppose?’
She hadn’t intended to make such a pointed remark about the groom’s family. It had slipped out before she could contain it, but his comments had irked, especially as she had been so worried about Vikki.
Ever since they had lost their parents within days of each other to that tropical disease six years ago, Lauren had found herself at eighteen playing mother and father to her often difficult and rebellious sixteen-year-old sister. Vikki had reacted to her parents’ death by lashing out at the world, and her anger and resentment at their loss had resulted in a spiralling lifestyle of alcohol-fuelled all-night parties, illegal drugs and far too many one-night stands.
Painfully, Lauren recalled how Vikki had refused to listen to her concerns about her ruining her life and eventually, when Vikki was still only seventeen, their differing opinions and clash in personalities meant they could no longer remain under the same roof and Lauren had seen very little of her sister over the next few years.
When Vikki had telephoned only three weeks prior to that party to say that she was not only pregnant, but getting married, Lauren had been as surprised as she’d been happy for her sister. She’d also had to secretly admit to feeling more than a little relieved.
It wasn’t until the sisters had met for a tearful reunion lunch that Lauren had learned of Vikki’s choice of husband, and her gratitude that her wayward sibling was finally settling down had dissipated on a surge of anxiety.
Angelo Cannavaro’s decadent lifestyle was legendary, with his penchant for glamorous women exceeded only by his wealthier, yet considerably more discreet older brother, who, by some miracle, had managed to keep himself and his personal life out of the papers! Which was why Lauren hadn’t instantly realised who he was on that first meeting. It hadn’t surprised her, though, to learn that Vikki’s year-long involvement with the twenty-five-year-old Italian playboy, whom she’d met while working as a croupier in a London nightclub, had already been a tempestuous on-off affair, with Angelo sounding rather too partial to his freedom, in Lauren’s mind, to make suitable husband material. Vikki had said he had changed since their last break-up only five months previously, but it had done very little to allay Lauren’s worries for her sister’s future.
‘It isn’t for me to cast aspersions on either the bridegroom or the calculating little blonde who’s so lucky to have him marrying her.’ She was unable to keep the sarcasm out of her voice as she clutched the glass she hadn’t remembered draining so tightly it was in danger of shattering. ‘And neither should you.’
Her reprimand, instead of shaming, seemed merely to amuse him.
With a smile touching his sensuous mouth, he allowed his gaze to stray with disturbing intensity over the fine symmetry of her face, down her rather flushed throat to her full breasts,
