He saw discovery and subsequent prosecution as inevitable, although it might take many months for evidence incriminating her to come to the fore in the police investigation, he had told her. On the other hand, since black pessimism seemed to be the order of the day, Mina knew that if the police were waiting for them on the tarmac as the jet landed he would probably not be too surprised, which was one of the main reasons why he had wanted to return alone to collect Susie.
Mina was in turmoil. Just when everything had been coming together for them, this had blown up in their faces: her supposed fraud. She had gone beyond bitterness but it did seem unnecessarily cruel that what had wrecked her life four years previously should now return to haunt her with even worse fears. If Cesare could not credit for one second that she was innocent, how the heck could she expect the police to believe her?
And how on earth could she feel confident when she sensed that Cesare was frantic on her behalf? Cesare…frantic and worried sick. Not something she had ever thought to witness. That scared her even more, because it underlined the seriousness of her situation. What was the point of repeatedly reiterating her innocence to him? And what were the chances that the real culprit would somehow be dug out of the woodwork and forced to answer for his crime? For his two crimes, Mina adjusted tautly. After all, a serious offence had been committed against her. She had been deliberately set up and falsely accused. But why? Why had someone taken the trouble to do that? The true offender could not have known that his broker would be arrested four years down the line and thus expose him to the possibility of prosecution.
Her head was aching so badly by the time they reached the limousine that, once inside, she rested her head back and closed her eyes, hoping to ease the throb of unbearable tension behind her temples.
Cesare reached out and closed his hand around hers. ‘I can’t let you go through this,’ he said abruptly, harshly.
‘What are you——?’
‘We can’t live with this threat hanging over us,’ he contended with hard emphasis. ‘I find it easier to meet trouble head-on rather than wait for it to find me. I will tell the police that I was the prime mover in the fraud and that you acted on my instructions.’
Her lashes swept up in shock. ‘No…nobody’s going to believe that!’
‘Why not? Being wealthy does not mean that one cannot also be greedy,’ Cesare retorted. ‘An employee in love with her boss…it is credible that you could have been persuaded to break the law on my behalf. In fact if you acted dumb you could probably persuade the police that you didn’t even know that what you did was illegal and you can’t be forced to testify against me——’
Mina had jerked upright again. ‘But you can’t take the blame for it!’
/> Cesare studied her intensely, his jawline clenching hard. ‘If it comes to prison, I could handle it. I don’t think you could.’
Her throat closed over. She met those brilliant dark eyes of his in a full-tilt collision. Cesare was not the sacrificial type, no martyr to anyone else’s cause, and there was a terrible irony in the fact that he would not have considered committing such an offence-—no, not even if the reward had been millions. She was devastated by the lengths he was prepared to go to in order to protect her. It was not as though he believed her innocent, not as though he believed she had been led astray by someone else.
‘Susie could get by without me for a while…but not without you,’ he pointed out wryly. ‘Meanwhile, just to hedge our bets, you get pregnant——’
‘Pregnant?’ Mina echoed, sinking into an even deeper daze of incredulity.
‘If I confess and you are pregnant it makes your prosecution even less likely,’ he said drily.
Her throat thickened with tears. ‘You can’t do it,’ she said flatly. ‘I won’t let you do it. This is my problem, not yours!’
‘You’re my wife——’
‘What the hell does that have to do with it?’ Mina slung at him in unhidden distress, and then she realised—or thought she realised—and the suspicion that occurred to her shook her inside out. Did he love her? Or did he simply see protecting her and Susie as his duty?
‘Everything.’ His lean fingers tightened fiercely on hers as he tugged her inexorably across the distance separating them.
Her tension suddenly gave way and with a muffled little moan, she threw herself into the heat and solidity of him, her hands frantic to touch, to hold and in some way repel the fear threatening to consume her. All she could see was their lives being ripped apart. ‘You can’t,’ she told him and she meant it, knew that no matter what happened there was no way she was going to hide behind him.
‘Bella…bella mia, have a little sense.’ With his thumb he rubbed at the bloodless line of her compressed mouth in reproof.
Her lips parted tremulously, the drugging heat of awareness leaping through her like sudden fire, inflamed by more than an edge of sheer desperation.
‘We should have made better use of last night,’ Cesare muttered raggedly. ‘I want you so much, I ache…’
Without warning, he pulled back from her and communicated with the chauffeur.
‘What are you doing?’
‘It’ll take over an hour in this traffic to reach the town house…’
Minutes later he was tugging her out of the limousine in front of a well-known hotel. Ten minutes after that they were standing in a luxurious bedroom.
‘This is crazy,’ Mina protested weakly.
‘Everything I do with you is crazy,’ he muttered thickly, hauling her into his arms.
He took her mouth with a wild, surging hunger. She went under like a novice swimmer, overwhelmed by the swirling currents of unashamed passion and sucked down mindlessly into the depths. But all the time her hands were busy. She wrenched off his jacket, embarked on his shirt buttons.