Kate Hewitt - The Italian's Bought Bride

It didn’t bother her on a day-to-day basis. She didn’t need these people. She had a new life now, a good one. When she’d left that night, she’d gained her freedom, but the price for that freedom had been, quite literally, everything.

It had been a price worth paying.

The music died down and Allegra saw everyone heading to the tables. Dinner was about to be served.

Taking another deep breath, she moved through the crowds again and found her place card. She was at a table tucked in the back with a motley handful of guests who looked to be nearly as out of place as she was. Distant, vaguely embarrassing relatives, colleagues and friends who necessitated an invitation yet were not an asset to the sparkling and successful party George Mason intended for his daughter.

An art therapist with a disreputable past certainly fitted into that category, Allegra thought ruefully.

With a murmured hello, she took her place between an overweight aunt and a weedy looking businessman. The meal passed in stilted conversations and awkward silences as eight misfits attempted to get along.

Allegra let the conversation wash over her in a meaningless tide of sound and wondered just how soon she could leave.

She wanted to see Daphne but, with the cold, ambitious Charles Edmunds at her cousin’s side, Allegra wasn’t expecting a cosy cousinly chat.

The plates were cleared and her uncle stood up to speak. Allegra watched him posture importantly, talking about how he knew Charles Edmunds, cracking business jokes. At one point he pontificated on the importance of family and she smothered the stab of resentment that threatened to pierce her composure.

Soon after, the music started up again and Allegra excused herself from the table before anyone could ask her to dance. The junior from Charles’s office had been eyeing her with a determined expression.

She moved through the crowds, her head held high, her eyes meeting no one else’s.

Daphne stood apart with her husband, pale and luminous in a designer wedding gown that hugged her slight figure before flaring out in a row of ruffles.

‘Hello, Daphne,’ Allegra said.

Her cousin—the cousin she’d shared summers in Italy with, swimming and laughing and plaiting each other’s hair—now turned to her with a worried expression.

‘Hh… Hello, Allegra,’ she said after a moment, her apprehensive gaze flicking to her husband. ‘Have you met Charles?’

Charles Edmunds smiled coolly. ‘Yes, your cousin came to our engagement party. Don’t you remember, darling?’

He made it sound as if she’d crashed the party. She supposed that was what her attendance felt like. Still, she’d wanted to come, had wanted to show that no matter what they did or thought, she was still family.

‘Daphne, I only wanted to congratulate you,’ Allegra said quietly. ‘I’m afraid I’m going to have to leave a bit early—’

‘Oh, Allegra—’ Daphne looked both relieved and regretful ‘—I’m sorry…’

‘No, it’s fine.’ Allegra smiled and squeezed her cousin’s hand. ‘It’s fine. I’m tired anyway. It’s been a long day.’

‘Thank you,’ Daphne whispered, and Allegra wondered just what her cousin was thanking her for. For coming? Or for leaving? Or for simply not making a scene?

As if she ever would. She’d only made one scene in her life, and she didn’t plan on doing so again.

‘Goodbye,’ she murmured, and quickly kissed her cousin’s cold cheek.

In the foyer, she found the cloakroom and handed the attendant her ticket. She watched as the woman riffled through the rack of luxury wraps for her own plain and inexpensive coat.

‘Here you are, miss.’

‘Thank you.’

She was just about to pull it on when she heard a voice—a voice of cool confidence and warm admiration. A voice that slid across her senses and into her soul, stirring up those emotions and memories she’d tried so hard to lock away.

It all came rushing back with that voice—the memories, the fear, the regrets, the betrayal. It hurtled back, making her relive the worst night of her life once more, simply by hearing two little words that she knew, somehow, would change her world for ever.

‘Hello, Allegra,’ Stefano said.

CHAPTER TWO

Seven years earlier

TOMORROW WOULD BE her wedding day. A day of lacy dresses and sunlit kisses, of magic, of promise, of joy and wonder.

Allegra pressed one hand to her wildly beating heart. Outside the Tuscan villa, night settled softly, stealing over purple- cloaked hills and winding its way through the dusty olive groves.

Inside the warm glow of a lamp cast the room into pools of light and shadow. Allegra surveyed her childhood bedroom: the pink pillows and teddy bears vying for space on her narrow girl’s bed, the shelf of well-thumbed Enid Blyton books borrowed from English cousins, her early sketches lovingly framed by her childhood nurse, and lastly—wonderfully—her wedding dress, as frothy a confection as any young bride could wish for, swathed in plastic and hanging from her cupboard door.

She let out a little laugh, a giggle of girlish joy. She was getting married!

She’d met Stefano Capozzi thirteen months ago, at her eighteenth birthday party. She’d seen him as she’d picked her way down the stairs in her new, awkward heels. He’d been waiting at the bottom like Rhett Butler, amber eyes glinting with promise, one hand stretched out to her.

She’d taken his hand as naturally as if she’d known him, as if she’d expected him to be there. When he’d asked her to dance, she’d simply walked into his arms.

It had been so easy. So right.

And, Allegra thought happily, there hadn’t been a misstep since. Stefano had asked her out a handful of times, to restaurants and the theatre and a few local parties. He’d written her letters from Paris and Rome, when he was on business, and sent her flowers and trinkets.

And then he’d asked her to marry him…to be his wife. And he would be her husband.

Another giggle escaped her and she heard an answering echo of a laugh from outside, low, throaty, seductive. Allegra opened the shutter and peeped out; she saw a couple in the shadow of a tree, arms, bodies entwined. The woman’s head was thrown back and the man was kissing her neck.

Allegra shivered. Stefano had never kissed her neck. The few times he’d kissed her, he had been chaste, almost brotherly, yet the brush of his lips against her skin had sent a strange sensation pooling deep inside, flooding through her with an unfamiliar, new warmth.

Now she watched, fascinated, as the unknown couple’s bodies moved and writhed in a sensuous dance.

She drew in a little breath, her eyes still fastened on the couple, the balmy night air cooling her flushed face. Suddenly she wanted to see Stefano. She wanted to say…what?

That she loved him? She’d never said those three little words, and neither had he, but it hardly mattered. Surely he saw it shining from her eyes every time she looked at him. And, as for Stefano…how could she doubt? He’d sought her out, he’d courted her like a troubadour. Of course he loved her.

Yet now she wanted to see him, talk to him. Touch him.

A blush rose to her face and she turned away from the window and the couple, who had moved further into the shadows, her hands pressed to her hot cheeks.

She’d only seen Stefano with his shirt off once, when they’d all gone swimming in the lake. She’d had a glimpse of bare, brown muscle before she’d jerked her gaze away.

And yet tomorrow they would be married. They would be lovers. She knew as much; even she, kept away in convent school, knew the basics of life. Of sex.

Her mind darted away from the implications, the impossibilities. What vague images her fevered brain conjured were blurred, strange, embarrassing.

Yet she still wanted to see him. Now.

Stefano was a night owl; he’d told her before. Allegra didn’t think he’d be in bed yet. He’d be downstairs, in her father’s study or library, reading one of his fusty old books.

She could find him.

Taking a breath, Allegra opened her bedroom door and crept down the passage. The soft September air was cool, although perhaps she was just hot.

Her hand was slick on the wrought iron railing as she went down the stairs. In the hall, she heard voices from the library.

‘This time tomorrow you will have your little bride,’ her father, Roberto, said. He sounded as sleekly satisfied as a tomcat.

‘And you will have what you want,’ Stefano replied, and Allegra jerked involuntarily at the sound of his voice—cool, urbane, indifferent.

She’d never heard him speak in such a tone before.

‘Yes, indeed I will. This is a good business arrangement for us both, Stefano…my son.’

‘Indeed it is,’ Stefano agreed in a bland tone that still somehow made Allegra shiver. ‘I’m pleased that you approached me.’

‘And not too bad a price, eh?’ Roberto chuckled, an ugly, indulgent sound. Allegra’s flesh crawled at the sound—a sound she realized she’d never heard, a sound she’d been protected from. Her father’s own callousness. Towards her.

‘Allegra’s mother has raised her well,’ Roberto continued. ‘She’ll give you five or six bambinos and then you can keep her in the country.’ He chuckled again. ‘She’ll know her place. And I know a woman in Milan…she’s very good.’

‘Is she?’

Allegra choked, one fist pressed to her lips. What was her father saying? What was Stefano saying?

Their words beat a remorseless echo in her numb brain. Business arrangement . A deal to be brokered. A bargain to be had.

A woman to be sold.

They were talking about a marriage. Hers.

She shook her head in mute, instinctive denial.

‘Yes,’ Roberto said, ‘she is. There are many pleasures for the married man, Stefano.’

Stefano gave a light answering laugh. ‘That I believe.’

Allegra closed her eyes, her hand still against her mouth. She felt dizzy and strange, her heart thudding hopelessly in her chest.

She took a calming breath and tried to think. To trust. Surely there was some explanation why Stefano was saying the things he was, sounding the way he was. If she just asked …it would be all right. Everything would be just as it had been.

‘Allegra! What are you doing here?’

Her eyes flew open. Stefano stood in front of her, an expression of concern—or was it annoyance?—on his face. Suddenly Allegra couldn’t tell. She wondered if she’d ever been able to tell.

Even now, her gaze roved hungrily over his features—the bronzed planes of his cheekbones, the thick chocolate-coloured hair swept away from his forehead, his amber eyes glinting in the dim light.

‘I…’ Her mouth was dry and the questions died in her heart. ‘I couldn’t sleep.’ ‘Too excited, fiorina? ’ Stefano smiled, but now everything had been cast into doubt and Allegra wondered if she saw arrogant amusement in that gesture rather than the tendernessshe’d always supposed. ‘In less than twelve hours we will be man and wife. Can you not wait until then to see me?’ He cupped her cheek, letting his thumb drift to caress her lips. Her mouth parted involuntarily and his smile deepened. ‘Go to bed, Allegra. Dream of me.’

He dropped his hand and turned away, dismissing her. Allegra watched him, watched the clean, broad lines of his back, tapering to narrow hips, watched him move away from her.

‘Do you love me?’ As soon as she’d asked the question, she wished she could bite back the words. Gobble them up and swallow them whole. They sounded desperate, pleading, pathetic.