‘Later.’ She thrust the box into her bag. She would put it in the drawer with his other gifts. She didn’t want to wear them either. Cesare seemed to think that keeping her happy meant spending a fortune on jewellery. He had already given her a fabulous gold watch and an emerald and diamond bracelet…not to mention a hideous stuffed fish in a glass case!
Freddy Fish, as she had christened him, had been an experiment to see whether or not she was right to assume that Cesare would buy absolutely anything she chose to admire. So yesterday she had admired the fish in an antique shop just to see how far he was prepared to go with his current policy of extravagantly flashing his wallet at every possible opportunity.
He had paled…but the grotesque fish had duly been purchased at an outrageous price. And Cesare, demonstrating a deviously disgusting desire to keep her sweet, had even sunk low enough to say that Freddy was a fascinating rarity. To punish him, Mina had said how wonderful it would be if she could make a collection of such things.
It was ten days since Cesare had tactlessly told her that they were scarcely the average newly-weds. And indeed they were not, Mina conceded miserably. Far from lolling about in indolence and idyllic passion, they had ‘done’ Sicily. From dawn to dusk, with Cesare in relentlessly energetic mode, she had been culturally forcefed with ruins, castles and cathedrals. They had spent several nights at Cesare’s luxurious villa on the coast.
At dusk, they generally went out for dinner, over which they made very polite conversation or discussed Susie, always a saviour when the conversation threatened to flag or veer into controversial territory. And in the early hours…they fell into their separate beds.
‘I would like you to wear a wedding-ring,’ Cesare delivered softly now.
It was a seriously challenging tone. In ten days seriously challenging was the closest Cesare had allowed himself to get to angry. He really was putting immense effort into being civilised, charming and considerate. But he was like a tiger in chains underneath the smooth front, and with every passing day of such treatment Mina became more depressed. She was convinced that Cesare was secretly bored out of his mind with her. Yet nobody could deny that he was doing everything possible to make their marriage of convenience work for Susie’s benefit.
‘Mina,’ he murmured.
‘I don’t want to wear a ring.’
For a split-second smouldering gold flared under the lush black lashes which she so envied and then he veiled his gaze. His sensual mouth compressed but he said nothing.
Mina watched him from behind her sunglasses. Breathtakingly good-looking and incredibly sexy and he didn’t want her any more. Having taken revenge out of the equation, Cesare appeared to have found a complete cure for the hunger which he had assured her would never be satisfied. Presumably his desire for revenge had previously lent her a quality of c
hallenging excitement which was now wholly absent. She now seemed to exude as much attraction for Cesare as Freddy Fish, she thought wretchedly.
He snapped his brown fingers for attention and settled the bill for their lunch. As he rose lithely upright, shrugging his broad shoulders back to straighten his jacket, Mina followed every fluid movement from behind the safe screen of her glasses. Her heartbeat was in earthquake mode, her breathing pattern shamefully fractured. In a devastatingly well-cut designer suit, his exquisitely tailored trousers defining every muscular line of his very long, lean legs, he held her entire attention.
‘Something wrong?’ he enquired lazily.
‘Nothing!’ Her voice emerged shrilly as she recalled him saying that on a physical response level he had been able to read her like a billboard four years ago. The idea that she might still be that easily read petrified her.
‘I think it’s time you met some of my friends,’ he announced without warning. ‘It would be a shame not to call in when we’re practically on their doorstep.’
He made a call on his mobile phone before he swung into the Ferrari again. He dealt Mina a sizzling smile that made her skin prickle. ‘I’m sure we’ll have an entertaining afternoon with Franca and her brother. Franca’s an actress. Roberto’s a producer.’
The Ecchio villa looked remarkably like a building on an extravagant filmset. It was palatial, furnished with a preponderance of faux marble pillars and grand gilded furniture. They had only got as far as the giant foyer when a tall and stunningly beautiful brunette with a waist-length mane of curling dark hair appeared. She was wearing something very short and flimsy in leopard print. Her equally stunning figure gleamed with golden perfection through every strategic cut-out. Indeed the outfit was so arresting that Mina gaped.
She needn’t have worried that her behaviour would be noticed. The brunette walked right past her as if she were invisible and fell on Cesare, kissing him passionately full on the mouth.
‘Franca…’ Cesare purred, making little attempt to detach himself from the indecently close press of that next-door-to-half-naked heavenly body.
Franca burst into a flood of exuberant Italian, slid an arm round him and proceeded to walk him away. Cesare replied at similar length and then glanced back with reluctance at Mina, prompting the actress finally to notice his companion.
‘Tina needs to freshen up,’ Franca said in perfect English, liquid dark eyes skimming over Mina’s simple yellow sundress pityingly as she signalled to a maidservant standing near by.
‘It’s Mina actually,’ she responded with cheeks that burned hotter than hellfire.
But Franca had already turned back to Cesare to lead him away. ‘The English dress so badly,’ she was saying in a stage-whisper which could have been heard a mile away. ‘Where on earth did you dig her up?’
Mina was shaking with shock and mortification by the time the maid had shown her into a cloakroom. She couldn’t believe that Cesare had simply walked away with that woman without making the slightest attempt to introduce her as his wife.
She looked in the mirror at the linen-mix dress which was two seasons old. This morning it had been immaculate but now it was badly creased. She cringed. All of a sudden, not wearing the clothes Cesare had bought her seemed a stupid and childishly rebellious act. Maybe he had been too ashamed of her appearance to admit that she was his wife, she found herself thinking painfully.
She had to find her own way to the social gathering by following the sound of voices out to a fabulously landscaped outdoor pool. A passing waiter paused to offer her a drink from the laden tray he was carrying. Mina accepted a glass. Three young women were sunbathing topless by the pool. Mina had only ever sunbathed topless in her twin’s presence…she could feel her skin turning brick-red again as she hurriedly glanced away from the surfeit of naked female flesh on display.
Cesare was seated at one of the tables beside Franca and several other men. Catching sight of Mina in the doorway, the brunette sprang up and advanced. ‘Tina…let me show you the swimwear.’ She planted a determined hand on Mina’s spine and propelled her across the tiled floor into a luxurious changing-room.
‘My name is Mina,’ Mina said quietly.
‘Whatever,’ Franca dismissed imperiously, making no attempt to open any of the built-in storage units as she studied Mina with irritated dark eyes. ‘You’re his secretary or something, right?’