Belle swallowed hard and contemplated lying before deciding that that was beneath her. ‘I peeled bits off to get at my nails but the extensions are glued on and not very palatable,’ she admitted grudgingly.
Dante grinned wickedly down at her, relaxed for the first time since his mother’s departure. ‘I’ll have someone come here to fix them for you. Good to know my solution is working. I haven’t seen you try to nibble for at least twenty-four hours.’
‘But what am I supposed to do when I’m nervous?’
‘Kiss me instead,’ Dante suggested lazily, tracing her ful
l lower lip with his forefinger so that prickling sexual awareness spread through every sensitive area of her body. ‘I guarantee that that will take your mind off your nails.’
But Belle backed away in haste and sat down on the brothel chair to reach for the Jane Austen she hadn’t read in years. The way Dante could make her feel with the smallest touch was terrifying and a frightening reminder that she wasn’t in control with him. Boundaries, there had to be boundaries, she told herself urgently, and she needed to impose some on herself quickly. This might not feel like casual sex because she was living in Dante’s home, but it was casual sex and she had to stop forgetting that and coming over all warm and willing and melting every time he got close. And that was not to try to stoke his interest either, that was just to preserve her sanity and her self-esteem. Belle was determined not to be hurt when she was no longer useful to Dante and he sent her back to the UK.
Dante sent her a wary appraisal, wondering what was wrong, missing the sparkle, the teasing, the warmth she usually emanated. He strode out of the room, reminding himself that he had work piling up.
‘Dante?’
He spun back to see Belle peering out at him. ‘Is it all right with you if I visit your brother’s dogs again?’
Dante lost his half-smile and shrugged a broad shoulder. ‘My driver is there to be used. He’ll take you wherever you like.’
Belle spent the rest of the morning reading and throwing a ball to exercise Charlie in the courtyard.
Dante joined her for lunch in the dining room. She spoke when he spoke but was otherwise quiet. Finally, he couldn’t stand it any longer and he said drily, ‘Look, I get that you’re in a mood but if it’s over something I’ve done I would rather you just told me what the problem is.’
‘I’m just uncomfortable with how you’re treating me,’ Belle confessed.
‘In what way?’
‘Surely we only have to behave like a couple when we’re in public? It’s sort of spilling over into private times as well and it’s...confusing.’ Belle settled for the word stiffly. ‘We’re not in a relationship as such.’
‘Aren’t we? I thought we were having an affair,’ Dante countered, disconcerted by her criticism and her evasive gaze. ‘If we’re not or you don’t want that, I will back off.’
And there it was, bang, flung right in her face, the absolute truth that she meant nothing to him. Pale as milk, Belle nodded. ‘I think that might be best for both of us.’
Dante gritted his teeth. Rejection was new to him and the shock of it hit him hard. He breathed in deep and slow. What was so confusing about an affair? But ego insisted he did not ask for further clarification. She was entitled to her space if she wanted it. Sex had never been part of their agreement. But how could she simply switch off like that? What had he done or said that had led to the change in her? Last night, she had been perfectly happy to be in his arms. But possibly he had always wanted her more than she wanted him, he told himself grimly. And possibly she wanted a peaceful night of sleep. Had he been too demanding? Too rough?
Belle shook away tears as she climbed into an SUV to go and visit Cristiano’s dogs. Well, he hadn’t argued with her, hadn’t tried to persuade her to change her mind, which merely proved what she had most feared: she was little more than a convenient sexual outlet on Dante’s terms. And she was worth more than that, ex-waitress, formerly living in a campervan, or not, she had to set a higher value on herself.
Tito and Carina were ecstatic to see her again and she took them out to the exercise yard and began trying to teach them to sit and stay, rewarding them with treats if they got it right, but they didn’t get it right very often.
‘Too old and spoilt to learn,’ the proprietor declared in broken English from where she was watching outside the fence.
* * *
Charlie ambled into Dante’s office without being noticed and strayed into a patch of sunlight where he promptly lay down and stretched on a priceless Persian rug. When he saw him there, Dante ignored him. Charlie ignored Dante, well trained by the experience of the restaurant, where non-dog-loving customers had also ignored him. Dante’s afternoon coffee arrived and the minute the tray arrived on his desk and he lifted a biscuit, Charlie shot back to life immediately to assume a surprisingly dainty begging position.
‘You’re clever,’ Dante registered as the terrier fixed imploring eyes on the biscuit.
Rewarded with a tiny piece, Charlie gave him a terrier grin and ambled back, satisfied, to his patch of sunlight.
A knock sounded on the door and Belle glanced in and saw Charlie. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I’ve been looking everywhere for him. I was going to ask you if you’d seen him.’
‘He’s a quiet little animal.’ Dante believed in giving honour where it was due and watched Charlie bounce up to greet his mistress to be lifted and hugged. ‘How were the terrible two?’
‘OK. I gave them some exercise.’
‘Shouldn’t think they would’ve liked that.’
‘No, they did. When they get tired they stop being so frantic.’
Dante studied her. Her hair tumbling round her shoulders, framing the perfect oval of her face, she wore a filmy green top and cropped jeans that were complete with paw prints he doubted that she had even noticed. And she still took his breath away. Her pouting pink mouth, buoyant breasts and curvy bottom inspired instant lust in him and the pulsing swell of arousal at his groin filled him with angry frustration. ‘Always the optimist. You like to take a positive approach to problems, don’t you?’
‘Usually,’ she agreed.
‘But not to me,’ Dante derided. ‘I’ve been judged and found wanting without a hearing.’
Belle flushed. ‘I’m sorry you feel like that. I was trying to be sensible.’
‘Clarify that,’ Dante urged, springing up from behind his desk to move forward.
Belle winced. ‘Living like this—the clothes, the jewellery, this gorgeous house—it would turn any ordinary girl’s head but it’s all a bit like the emperor’s clothes in the fairy tale. It’s not real and it’s not mine and it’s not going to last,’ she reasoned uncomfortably, staring at him, drinking in the effect of all that devastating dark male beauty before bolstering her nerve and biting the bullet of the unlovely truth. ‘And I don’t want to fall in love with you and get hurt.’
A sizzling silence fell. A woman had never been that honest with Dante before and he was knocked for six by that blunt confession. ‘I can’t believe you said that.’
‘Well, no point in lying about it, is there? After all, you can’t want me getting attached to you either,’ Belle quipped. ‘And what you call an affair is very intense for me because I’ve never been in a serious relationship...and yes, I know this isn’t serious for you, but for me, it is.’
‘OK...’ Dante spread expressive brown hands, taking a step back as if she had mentioned something dangerously contagious. He had even paled a little. ‘But it’s not love, it’s infatuation because I was your first lover. You’ll shake it off fast enough.’
‘Er...thanks for that sage advice...’ Belle said, eyes wide as she summoned Charlie and walked out again with as much dignity as she could muster.
Dante released his breath in a hiss. He had never been in love. Cristiano had fallen for a long line of users and losers. Cristiano had been on a constant mission to find his one true love, and watching his brother had taught Dante that love was a car crash of insane hope colliding with nasty truths as the loved one revealed one flaw after another. Of course, Belle wasn’t falling for him, but she had played a blinder with that argument because he wasn’t about to try and touch her again. She had frightened him off. Quite deliberately too. For a split second he was amused but that reaction swiftly drained away.
What was wrong with him? He felt as if someone had dropped a giant rock on him. He felt weird. He needed to find another woman to focus on, he tol
d himself fiercely, wipe out the last crazy week and forget about Belle altogether. How hard could that be? Off with the old, on with the new. That had always been his way.
Belle curled back up with her book and wondered how she would face Dante over dinner. She cringed and pressed hot hands to her even hotter face and groaned out loud. How could she have said that to him? How could she have humiliated herself so completely? But it was true that she was developing inappropriate feelings for him and she had to put a stop to that and the only way to stop it was to cut out the intimacy. So what if she was still stuck sharing a bed with him for show?
Belle dined alone and, after a long bath, went to bed early. Dante stalked through his usual club haunts and an exclusive party in Florence, finding something offensive about every woman who paid heed to him until it finally dawned on him that the only woman he actually wanted was, ironically, at home in his bed...and he couldn’t have her. Was that what made her different and so much more desirable? Was it because she had rejected him? Was it his ego playing up?
Or was he more honourable than he had ever realised? He didn’t want to hurt her, he acknowledged over his fifth drink. He checked into a plush city hotel for the night, not trusting himself anywhere near her in the strange introspective mood he was in. He couldn’t sleep. He kept thinking about Belle in his bed and remembering how she had made him feel. Weird, she’d made him feel weird, he decided around dawn.
Belle woke up in an empty bed and wondered where Dante had spent the night. She felt guilty because she had clearly made him feel uncomfortable in his own home. As she went downstairs for breakfast she saw Dante mounting the steps, looking rather the worse for wear. His tie was missing, his jacket was crumpled and he was unshaven, a dark growth of stubble darkening his already-forbidding features. She bolted into the dining room at speed.
If she had had the nerve, she would have jibed, ‘Walk of shame, Dante?’ Only, she didn’t have the nerve to confront him with a possibility that tore through her with the slashing pain of a knife...the very real possibility that he had spent the night with another woman.