Daniele raked his fingers through his hair. His experiences when he had been a member of the special forces meant that he was rarely shocked by anything, but he could not get his head around the idea that he was the first man Paloma had given herself to. Why had she decided to bestow the honour on him? For it was an honour, and one that Daniele knew he did not deserve.
He slid out of bed and strode into the dressing room to pull on his trousers. His wife might not want to talk, but he needed answers. He could not risk being naked near her in case his body betrayed his hunger that was more ravenous than ever when he remembered her cries of pleasure as she’d climaxed around him.
When he returned to the bedroom, he found Paloma perched on the edge of the bed. She was swathed in a fluffy white bathrobe that was too big for her slender frame. Her eyes looked suspiciously pink, as if she’d been crying. Daniele fought the urge to pull her into his arms and kiss the crumpled expression from her lips. ‘You owe me an explanation,’ he said tautly. ‘I suggest you start at the beginning.’
She bit her lip. ‘To do that, I have to go back three years. Further, in fact, to when I was a teenager and developed a crush on my grandfather’s new computer expert. You knew, of course, and I’m grateful that you were kind to me, especially after my father was killed.’
He nodded. ‘Your father’s death was devastating for Marcello, who lost his only son and heir. But you had lost a parent when you were at a vulnerable age and I knew what that felt like. I will never forget being told that my father was dead. Grief is a lonely place. You were still a child, and I was glad to share my experience if it helped you to come to terms with your loss.’
Paloma sighed. ‘I had led a sheltered life in England, mostly at an all-girls boarding school. When I went to university, I’d never had a real boyfriend, and I felt out of my depth when I was asked out on dates. Things never went further than a kiss at the end of the evening.’ She gave Daniele a wry look. ‘It wasn’t just my naivety. Many of the students on the campus knew that I was an heiress, and I was never sure if guys were interested in me or my money. When I became an intern at Morante Group, and met you again, I fantasised that you were attracted to me. But at the ball you insisted it had been a mistake to kiss me. I assumed you had kissed me back out of pity because I didn’t have a partner at the party,’ she said in a low voice.
Daniele frowned, remembering how he had been unable to resist Paloma’s shy advances. He’d kissed her because he had been fiercely aware of her for weeks before the night of the ball. ‘I don’t see how this has any relevance,’ he growled.
‘I felt a fool and rushed back to London, determined to forget you. Weeks later, I met Calum, and his flattery was a salve to my dented ego. In hindsight, I should have known that he was too good to be true,’ she said bleakly. ‘I was eager for romance and Calum was very convincing. He said he had fallen in love with me at first sight. When I told him I was inexperienced, he assured me that he wanted to wait until our wedding night before we had sex so it would be more special. But even though I believed I loved Calum, I hoped you would feel jealous when you heard, as you were bound to do from my grandfather, that I was married.’
‘Are you suggesting I was responsible for your marriage that you have admitted was a disaster from the start?’ Daniele controlled his temper with an effort. ‘You still haven’t explained how you were a virgin.’
Paloma blushed. The clues to her innocence had been in front of him, Daniele thought grimly. She hadn’t been leading him on after the Morante Foundation charity ball; she had been terrified. Now he understood the reason for her faint hesitancy when he’d taken her to bed tonight. But she had responded to him with a passion that had matched his own and he hadn’t guessed that she was a novice.
‘Calum was drunk for pretty much the whole of our honeymoon and the marriage was not consummated. When we returned to London and moved into our new house, I hoped things would improve, but the man who had treated me like a princess before the wedding had become distant and withdrawn.’ Paloma avoided Daniele’s gaze. ‘The few times Calum attempted to make love to me were humiliating. I tried everything. Sexy underwear, massage oils.’ She blushed. ‘I even bought a couple of sex toys. But nothing worked. He said he’d never had a problem before. It was me. I didn’t turn him on.’
‘Your ex-husband must have been made of stone,’ Daniele gritted. ‘Just the idea of you using a sex toy is incredibly erotic. Why did you think the problem was your fault?’
‘He said it was, and I felt guilty that I couldn’t be a proper wife. Things went from bad to worse. Calum often stayed out all night and I suspected that he was having an affair. I suggested we sought marriage counselling or saw a sex therapist. He laughed and said there was nothing wrong withhim. And then he told me that he was seeing his girlfriend who he’d been in a relationship with before I’d met him, and she was pregnant with his child.’ She grimaced. ‘I wondered if his conscience had stopped him from having sex with me because he was going to be a father to another woman’s baby. But Calum was the only man I’d ever tried to have sex with, and I believed him when he said I was passionless.’
‘Dio, if you had responded to me any more passionately, we would have gone up in flames.’ Daniele needed a drink. He strode across the room and grabbed the bottle of whisky that had been left on a small table. Paloma shook her head when he offered her a drink. He half filled a glass and took a long sip, feeling the fiery hit of alcohol hit his bloodstream. ‘Why did you have sex with me? You made the first move,’ he reminded her.
She blushed again. ‘Are you saying you were reluctant to make love to me?’
He gave a snort of derision. ‘I took you to bed because I was out of my mind with desire. You saw for yourself that you only had to look at me to give me an erection. But why did you give yourself to me?’
‘I couldn’t bear to wake up in the morning after my second wedding night andstillbe a virgin.’
Daniele clenched his jaw to stop himself from swearing. ‘So you used me as astud?’ Bile tasted bitter in his throat. He was enraged, believing that he had been manipulated by Paloma. It followed the conversation with his mother when he’d discovered that he had been manipulated by his grandmother Elsa, who he suspected had hidden the letters that Claudia Farnesi said she had sent him during his childhood.
‘I would not have had sex with you if I’d been aware that you were a virgin,’ he told Paloma curtly.
‘Were you lying about it being good for you?’ she asked in a low voice. ‘You said I was incredible, but I know I’m not.’
‘I was not referring to your performance,’ he bit out, furious with himself for being affected by the vulnerable expression in her eyes. Daniele vowed to himself that if he ever had the chance he would throttle her ex-husband. ‘Sex with you was amazing. But that’s not the point. You were dishonest and deceived me.’
‘I didn’t lie.’ She looked away from him. ‘I admit I was economical with the truth.’
Daniele drained the whisky in his glass. ‘Your grandfather gave me the task of taking care of you, but I have broken my code of honour and integrity by taking your innocence. I thought there was trust between us, but clearly, that is not the case.’ It hurt, dammit, that Paloma had kept a huge secret from him. ‘You should have told me that you were a virgin,mia bella, disonesta moglie,’ he said savagely, before he strode into the dressing room and slammed the door behind him.
Paloma’s jaw ached from smiling. Thankfully, the wedding brunch hosted by Prince Dragan for those guests who had spent the night at the castle was nearly over. But she doubted she would be able to relax when she and Daniele flew back to Italy by private jet. She had not been alone with him since she’d watched him stride out of the bedroom and they had spent the rest of the night apart. When she’d woken in the morning, Daniele had gone from the tower. He had met her at the door to the orangery and escorted her to the brunch party. Both of them had pretended to be happy newly-weds, but Paloma’s heart felt like a lead weight in her chest.
When she’d curled up beneath the covers in that huge bed last night, she’d cried herself to sleep. Her omission to mention she was a virgin had been wrong, she acknowledged. As a result, she had lost Daniele’s respect. Honesty was important to him, and he was devastated by the possibility that his grandmother had allowed him to believe his mother hadn’t cared about him.
She glanced at him, sitting beside her at the table in the light-filled orangery. He looked gorgeous in pale chinos and a black polo shirt. Dark shades hid his expression and he appeared to be utterly relaxed, while she felt confused and miserable and was desperately trying to conceal her emotional turmoil. Paloma guessed he regretted making love to her, although throughout lunch he’d played the role of attentive husband so well that her heart ached for the connection she had felt between them last night when they had danced on the balcony.
She had foolishly allowed herself to imagine that their marriage was more than a cold-blooded bargain, and when Daniele had made love to her with such tender consideration as well as tumultuous passion, the connection had felt even stronger. But she had been mistaken—again, Paloma thought dismally. Daniele had married her to increase his social status, and he was no different from most other people who wanted something from her because she was an heiress with an aristocratic background.
‘Has your husband told you where he is taking you on honeymoon?’ Prince Dragan asked. He was sitting opposite Paloma at the table and several times she had been aware of his dark-eyed scrutiny. She hoped he did not notice how she tensed with shock before she forced her muscles to relax and gave a strained smile. A honeymoon was news to her.
‘Daniele is keeping the location a secret,’ she said in a falsely bright voice.
‘It is not a good thing to have secrets in a marriage.’ The Prince sounded serious.