‘Enough time has passed now and it’s a beautiful, tranquil place. We can relax here but we can also easily go out as well,’ Gianni pointed out calmly. ‘It feels good to be back under this roof.’
‘I’m glad,’ she told him gently.
Antoine served them a superb late lunch that included a tapenade starter and a sea bass and asparagus salad. The meal finished with home-made ice cream and fresh cherries. Replete and laughing at Antoine’s suggestion that they might also enjoy some cake with their coffee, they sat chatting in the shade.
The next morning, Gianni took her into Villeneuve to explore the Saint-André gardens and the art exhibition in the abbot’s palace. It was a peaceful place to wander, and Jo took countless photos for her grandmother’s benefit. Liz Hamilton was the gardening enthusiast at Ladymead, and Jo knew that she would enjoy seeing the roses in full bloom, the beautiful pergola walk and the colourful mosaic of parterres and flowerbeds. The views from the terraces out over Avignon, the Alpilles and Mont Ventoux were spectacular. An evening meal in a tiny exclusive restaurant completed the day.
Before they climbed back into the car, Gianni cupped his hands to her cheeks to keep her still and kissed her passionately. It was as though an electrical charge raced through her veins and the feel of his aroused body against hers only made her push closer to increase the connection.
‘My word!’ she exclaimed in the aftermath, rocked on her feet by how hot that single kiss had proved to be. The dull throb of desire between her thighs was instantaneous.
A grin slashed Gianni’s mouth. ‘You have the same effect on me.’
‘I’ve recovered,’ she confided shyly.
‘Is that a fact, Signora Renzetti?’ he teased.
Gianni’s phone was buzzing when they entered the house.
‘Go on up to bed and I’ll follow you up,’ he urged. ‘I have to take this call.’
Her curiosity sparked and she glanced at his shuttered expression before going upstairs. She fell asleep long before Gianni joined her.
‘Who was that on the phone last night? You were absolutely ages,’ she complained when she wakened the next morning.
‘It was Fiona, a close friend from my student days.’
‘An ex?’ Jo questioned.
Gianni compressed his lips. ‘A connection,’ he rephrased. ‘She didn’t receive our wedding invite, so the news that I was married came as a shock. I should’ve made the effort to phone her to tell her personally.’
Jo was annoyed that he had spent so long talking to another woman the night before. And what was the difference between an ex and a‘connection’? Why was he being so secretive when it came to voicing simple facts? Furthermore, if the other woman weren’t an ex, why would she be shocked by news of his marriage? And how was she supposed to feel when this was thethirdincident relating to another woman since their wedding, the third incident in the space of four days?
First there had been the hurt, jealous drunk at their wedding, then his fierce reluctance to discuss his past relationships. And now Fiona, the woman he had had to talk to in private. So, who was Fiona? A ‘connection’ ortheactual ex-girlfriend who had hurt him when he was at university? Was it possible he was still in touch with his first serious love? Stranger things happened, she acknowledged. In silence, Jo quietly fumed and fretted. How many other blasted women were likely to come out of the woodwork? She would have been less suspicious of Gianni had she not been aware of his womanising reputation prior to their marriage. As she saw it, that meant that Gianni required careful observation and handling, but she assured herself that she was too intelligent to openly parade her misgivings and make them a stumbling block in their relationship.
He stroked long caressing fingers down a slender thigh and Jo shifted and stretched like a sleepy cat. ‘You missed a treat last night,’ she told him out of sheer badness.
‘I’m here now,’ he pointed out.
‘Too late!’ Jo laughed as she slid out of bed with the dexterity of an eel escaping a net. ‘Antoine promised to show me how to make croissants if I got up early enough.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
GIANNIWATCHEDJOvanish into the bathroom in a movement as sleek and fast as the flow of quicksilver and suppressed a curse.
He hadn’t expected Jo to have a mercurial side, but she did. Yet she held his attention like a magnet. In addition, she enjoyed a depth of charm that could only impress him whether it was chattering to Antoine in her inept schoolgirl French or meticulously noting down the names of the roses she had captured in photos for her grandmother’s benefit. She was gracious, kind, and thoughtful. In fact, his bride was a much more complex creature than he had initially assumed: disarmingly honest and chatty while at the same time contriving to be ridiculously mysterious. It disturbed Gianni that he very rarely guessed what was going on inside Jo’s head before she spoke.
Gianni had gone when Jo returned to the bedroom to pull on shorts and a T-shirt ready for her baking lesson. Her generous mouth down curved and she scolded herself for that secret sense of disappointment. She refused to feel any more for Gianni than he felt for her. To get more deeply involved with him would only lead to her being hurt. He had spelt out the boundaries of their relationship and love didn’t come into it.
He had work to catch up on, had mentioned that necessity the evening before. She was conscious that within days he would be facing the board meeting where he might still find himself voted out as CEO of Renzetti Inc. What would it do to their relationship if it turned out that their marriage had failed to change anything for the better? Then, she would be surplus to requirements, she reflected worriedly.
Gianni spent the morning working on his laptop and Jo strove to copy Antoine’s slick skills in the kitchen with varying results. Gianni drank his espresso and accepted without comment a horribly misshapen croissant made by his wife’s own fair hand. Later, having lost himself in work, he glanced out of the window and saw her weeding the shrubbery in the garden while Antoine cut the grass on the mower. He grinned. He could not think of a single woman he had ever been with who would have let him work undisturbed while quietly occupying herself with weeds.
He strolled out to talk to her. ‘I’m finished for the day. Let’s go out.’
‘Give me another ten minutes and I’ll have finished this,’ she urged, wiping the perspiration from her brow. ‘I hate leaving a job half done.’
‘You look incredibly sexy,’ he breathed in a husky undertone.