‘The black was too provocative and the red was too—hot, so it has to be the white.’
Refusing to answer him, she turned away and stalked off towards the sitting room with her cheeks still on fire.
He was on fire again. He was even grinning as he paced after her. Without a word, he diverted into the kitchen, saw the champagne waiting in its bucket of melted ice, and the grin grew wider because he was perfectly happy again.
Edward didn’t matter. Her feelings for Edward didn’t matter—if that was what had been bothering him so much back there…
Natalia removed her jacket and draped it over one of the white leather chairs, then began pacing the sunken area with a tension that showed in her face.
She shouldn’t be here with him. His strange attitude before had tugged a bit of sanity to the fore. It was wrong. It was dangerous. He belonged to the enemy camp. What happened if Edward ever found out? What would her being with Giancarlo Cardinale, of all men, do to him?
She should leave, she told herself. Now, while she had the chance to do it without having to explain herself. He’d disappeared, she didn’t know where. She could just pick up her things and run.
Then what? asked the voice of reason. What happens tomorrow—do you hide away in your little house so he can’t get you, and lose your job in the interim? How would you explain that away to Edward on his return without making Giancarlo look like the bad guy in all of this, when in actual fact it’s you who is being bad here?
And—do you want him or don’t you want him? she then asked herself impatiently. For those are the only two questions which should really count. After all, you can’t go on for ever running your life to suit Edward’s feelings. Especially when Edward was not willing to run his life according to yours!
So—do you want Giancarlo Cardinale, or don’t you want him?
He appeared in the opening. He had done it again, was the first disturbing thing she thought. His jacket had gone, so had his tie, and the top two buttons on his shirt had been tugged undone. The wretched man had a habit of half undressing in her company that always managed to shatter her composure.
Or what bit of composure she ever possessed around him, she wryly expanded, noticing that he was also carrying the bottle of champagne and two fluted glasses which acted as yet another trigger, flipping her mind like a coin from one face to another.
Yes, I want this man, the new face said. Yes, I need this man! I can do this. I can love him and leave him when the time comes! I can—I can!
CH
APTER SEVEN
‘HOLD that thought, whatever it is,’ Giancarlo murmured lazily as he came down the steps to join Natalia.
He was smiling and relaxed, but the closer he came, the more tense she became, because, now it came right down to it, she didn’t think she could carry this through with the savoir-faire he was probably expecting.
Maybe he sensed it, because there was a curious expression in his eyes as he came to stand beside her, and, although his attention was mainly involved in putting the two glasses down on the marble table so he could begin pouring champagne, he kept on sending her the odd glance, as if he couldn’t quite make his mind up what it was that made her tick inside.
She wished she knew herself but sadly she didn’t, or she would know how she should be behaving. Was she supposed to indulge in some light conversation to bridge the gap between this moment and the one where they moved on to the bedroom? Or should she be making certain moves on him to encourage along that second stage?
It didn’t really matter because neither suggestion was possible for her right now. She felt too out of her depth, too tongue-tied by too little experience and especially with a man like him.
Picking up the two frothing glasses, he turned to hand one of them to her. She took it, eyes lowered now because that seemed the easiest way to get through these next few telling minutes.
‘Sip,’ he commanded.
Obediently, she sipped while he watched with a new kind of stillness that brought the colour streaking into her cheeks. The champagne tingled on her tongue, then did the same all the way to her stomach.
‘Again,’ he said and received mute obedience a second time.
He waited until she had made her second swallow, then his hand came to gently lift her chin—and he was no longer smiling. ‘Last chance, cara,’ he murmured quietly. ‘I must be sure that this is what you want.’
Was it? she asked herself. Was jumping in the deep end when she barely knew how to swim what she really wanted to do? No, not really. ‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘This is what I want.’
‘Then why the sudden look of anxiety?’ he prompted.
‘You told me to hold the thought,’ she wryly pointed out.
‘That belonged to a different thought,’ he returned. ‘I am now discussing the one that denies me your eyes.’
Lifting her lashes, she looked directly into his dark and sombre eyes and smiled a wry smile at his even needing to ask that question. ‘I’ve known you for less than a week, and you wonder why I am anxious about this?’