since she had left him he had waited for this moment—for a chance to prove to her how much she wanted him in spite of her protestations. His rage at being cut from her life had festered inside him. It had soured every other relationship since. He could not seem to find what he was looking for with anyone else. He had gone from relationship to relationship, some lasting only a date or two, none of them lasting more than a month. Lately he had even started to wonder if he had imagined how perfectly physically in tune he had been with her. But seeing her again, being in the same room as her, sensing her reaction to him and his to her, proved to him it wasn’t his imagination.
She wouldn’t be the one who walked out on him without notice this time around. She would stay with him until he decided he’d had enough. It might take a month or two, maybe even up to a year, but he would not give her the chance to rip his heart open again. He would not allow her that close again. He had been a passionate fool five years ago. From the moment he had met her he had fallen—and fallen hard. He had envisaged their future together, how they would build on the empire of his grandparents and parents, how they would be the next generation of Bellandinis.
But then she had ripped the rug from under his feet by betraying him.
She might hate him for what he was doing, but right now he didn’t give a damn. He wanted her and he was going to have her. She would come to him willingly. He would make sure of that. There would be no forcing, no coercing. Behind that ice-maiden façade was a fiercely passionate young woman. He had unleashed that passion five years ago and he would do so again.
‘In time you will be begging for my touch, cara,’ he said. ‘Just like you did in the past.’
Her expression shot more daggers at him. ‘Can’t you see how much I hate you?’ she said.
‘I can see passion, not hate,’ he said. ‘That is promising, si?’
She let out a breath and put more distance between them, her look guarded and defensive. ‘How soon do you expect to get this ridiculous plan of yours off the ground?’ she asked.
‘We will marry at the end of next week,’ he said. ‘There’s no point dilly-dallying.’
‘Next week?’ she asked, eyes widening. ‘Why so soon?’
Angelo held her gaze. ‘I know how your mind works, Natalie. I’m not leaving anything up to chance. The sooner we are married, the sooner your brother gets out of trouble.’
‘Can I see him?’
‘No.’
She frowned. ‘Why not?’
‘He’s not allowed visitors,’ Angelo said.
‘But that’s ridiculous!’ she said. ‘Of course he’s allowed visitors. It’s a basic human right.’
‘Not where he is currently staying,’ he said. ‘You’ll see him soon enough. In the meantime, I think it’s time I met the rest of your family—don’t you agree?’
Something shifted behind her gaze. ‘Why do you want to meet my family?’ she said. ‘Anyway, apart from Lachlan there is only my parents.’
‘Most married couples meet their respective families,’ Angelo said. ‘My parents will want to meet you. And my grandparents and uncles and aunts and cousins.’
She gave him a worried look. ‘They’re not all coming to the ceremony, are they?’
‘But of course,’ he said. ‘We will fly to Rome on Tuesday. The wedding will be on Saturday, at my grandparents’ villa, in the private chapel that was built especially for their wedding day sixty years ago.’
Her eyes looked like a startled fawn’s. ‘F-fly?’
‘Si, cara,’ he said dryly. ‘On an aeroplane. You know—those big things that take off at the airport and take you where you want to go? I have a private one—a Lear jet that my family use to get around.’
Her mouth flattened obstinately. ‘I’m not flying.’
Angelo frowned. ‘What do you mean, you’re not flying?’
She shifted her gaze, her arms tightening across her body. ‘I’m not flying.’
It took Angelo a moment or two to figure it out. It shocked him that he hadn’t picked it up before. It all made sense now that he thought about it.
‘That’s why you caught the train down from Edinburgh yesterday,’ he said. ‘That’s why, when I suggested five years ago that we take that cut-price trip to Malta, you said you couldn’t afford it and refused to let me pay for you. We had a huge fight over it. You wouldn’t speak to me for days. It wasn’t about your independence, was it? You’re frightened of flying.’
She turned her back on him and stood looking out of his office window, the set of her spine as rigid as a plank. ‘Go on,’ she said. ‘Call me a nut job. You wouldn’t be the first.’
Angelo released a long breath. ‘Natalie … Why didn’t you tell me?’
She still stood looking out of the window with her back to him. ‘Hi, my name’s Natalie Armitage and I’m terrified of flying. Yeah, that would have really got your notice that night in the bar.’
‘What got my notice in that bar was your incredible eyes,’ he said. ‘And the fact that you stood up to that creep who was trying it on with you.’
He saw the slight softening of her spine and shoulders, as if the memory of that night had touched something deep inside her, unravelling one of the tight cords of resolve she had knotted in place. ‘You didn’t have to rescue me like some big macho caveman,’ she said after a short pause. ‘I could’ve taken care of it myself.’
‘I was brought up to respect and protect women,’ Angelo said. ‘That guy was a drunken fool. I enjoyed hauling him out to the street. He was lucky I didn’t rearrange his teeth for him. God knows I was tempted.’
She turned and looked at him, her expression still intractable. ‘I don’t want to fly, Angelo,’ she said. ‘It’s easy enough to drive. It’ll only take a couple of days. I’ll make my own way there if you can’t spare the time.’
Angelo studied her dark blue gaze. He saw the usual obstinacy glittering there, but behind that was a flicker of fear—like a stagehand peeping out from behind the curtains to check on the audience. It made him wonder if he had truly known her five years ago. He had thought he had her all figured out, but this was a facet to her personality he had never even suspected. He had always prided himself on his perspicuity, on his ability to read people and situations. But he could see now that reading Natalie was like reading a complex multilayered book.
‘I’ll be with you the whole time,’ he said. ‘I won’t let anything happen to you.’
‘That’s hardly reassuring,’ she said with a cynical look, ‘considering this whole marriage thing you’ve set up is a plot for revenge.’
‘My intention is not for you to suffer,’ he said.
Her chin came up and her eyes flashed again. ‘Oh, really?’
Angelo
