Time crawled before she ended the call. She looked at him with eyes swimming with concern. Such an accomplished actress!
“Emilio isn’t answering.” She brushed back her wealth of sun-kissed hair with an impatient hand. “Something must be wrong.”
This was a stall tactic on her part and he’d have none of it. It was time she accepted the consequences of her own actions.
“Perhaps your brother is involved in a game.”
“Game?” she parroted.
“Poker. He’s spent long days in Monte Carlo the past week,” he said. “But his luck has deserted him and he’s down to bartering his assets to gamble.”
She went still, her face leached of color and her eyes far too huge for her gamine face. Prey. She looked like prey, and in that tense moment he was gripped by the urge to protect instead of ruin her.
Maledizione! How could she stir such emotions in him?
“No! He wouldn’t do that.”
“I assure you he has done exactly that. Two weeks ago I accepted one of his trawlers to bankroll him in a game.” An aged gas-guzzling behemoth that caused more pollution than it was worth, but Stefano gladly paid the price just to get it off the waters.
Had he known then about Gemma and her wastrel brother, he’d have stayed in the game that had soon bored him just to bring her brother down. For it was clear that Gemma had made sure that the two of them profited greatly off his papa’s largess.
That was just the reminder he needed to harden his resolve. “If I hadn’t bought the trawler then someone else would have.”
“No! Emilio can’t still be gambling,” she said, shaking her head. “There is another reason why he hasn’t arrived yet.”
Could she be that blind to the truth?
As there was a strong chance that the pigeon returned to the same gaming tables tonight to roost, he made a call on his mobile to his closest friend, drilled a finger into the speaker icon and laid the phone on the table.
“Bonjour,” came Jean Paul’s greeting.
“Ciao,” Stefano replied. “Where are you?”
“Monte Carlo,” his friend said. “Sun Casino to be precise. The high stakes poker game starts in less than an hour.”
“Do you remember the young fisherman who sold me the old trawler a couple of weeks ago?” Stefano asked and locked gazes with Gemma.
“Oui. Cardone,” he said. “He’s here again and has just won five hundred thousand euros at the blackjack table. That win has certainly secured him an invitation to the game tonight.”
Gemma shot to her feet. “No! Emilio doesn’t have that kind of money. How could he think to take that risk?”
Stefano ruthlessly blocked her troubled image from his mind and spoke to Jean Paul. “In case you did not hear the lady, where did Cardone come by that much capital?”
“He has steadily won all day, the last round being the largest take yet.”
Enough to pay the debt to Marinetti and then some, Stefano would wager. But the gambler’s blood in Cardone lured him to increase it. To risk all. To ruin his sister?
“Has Cardone made any calls this evening?” Stefano asked.
“Not that I could tell. Although his phone did ring a while ago,” Jean Paul said. “He answered it then promptly hung up.”
Gemma’s narrow shoulders lost a bit of their stiff edge to bow in as if on the verge of collapse.
What was the American saying? No honor among thieves?
Her brother knew full well she’d be waiting here with Stefano. He knew the consequences if she failed to make the payment tonight.
Her brother had left her to sink or swim.
Yes, he wanted the woman with a ravenous hunger.
Yes, he would have her.
But it wouldn’t be to save her brother from ruin.
“Watch him,” Stefano said, then ended that call and assessed his dinner companion.
Gemma’s frantic gaze flicked over him. Her obvious pain was a gut punch he hadn’t expected.
She had used his father. She’d caused his mamma pain. But the satisfaction he’d expected from besting her didn’t come.
“You have less than an hour to meet the first loan payment,” he reminded her. “Will you concede defeat now?”
She shook her head and he knew before she opened her mouth that she’d voice a protest. “The least you could have done was extend the deadline until morning when the banker is scheduled to give me his answer on my loan request. Cesare would have.”
How dare she drag his papa into this argument! “I am sure you would have done your best to persuade Papa to let the debt ride longer. You have succeeded in draining his accounts to the extreme already!”
“I’ve done no such thing,” she shot back.
“No? Then explain why my father transferred five hundred thousand euros into a private account bearing your name? What did you do with that money, plus all the monthly withdrawals he placed in your name?”
Her face turned whiter than Carrara marble. “I can’t.”
“Or won’t,” he said. “You were given enough money to build a five-star hotel that would gross millions. There will be no extensions. No second chances.”
She shook her head and rubbed her temples. Her distress failed to stir his pity. She and her worthless brother had brought this on themselves. Now she’d suffer the consequences.
Revenge was in his grasp.
“I HATE you!” She tossed her napkin on the table, unwilling to sit here a moment longer with such a ruthless man. Mio Dio, what a nightmare!
“I could care less what you think of me, Miss Cardone.”
She wasn’t surprised for he was surely the most heartless man she’d ever had the displeasure of meeting. “Did you gain great satisfaction stripping my brother of his means to make a living?”
Stefano’s muscular frame tensed, like a large cat waking from a nap and sensing trouble. “Your brother offered the vessel in order to remain in the game. If I hadn’t paid his price, someone else would have.”
She knew he was right, but facing the awful truth was crushing. Behind her back Emilio had been living the life of a playboy even though he didn’t have the funds to squander. For how many months had he deceived them all?
Too many, she feared. She truly believed her brother had beaten his addiction over a year ago. But she’d been wrong.
She’d never dreamed he’d lie and hide the truth from her and in the process lose the business their father had worked and died for. And now because of his false promise to help her tonight, because she’d trusted her brother, she stood to lose her half of the inn!
“Scusi,” she said and made for the door, her mind racing to find the swiftest means to reach Monte Carlo.
“Where are you going?”
“To my brother.”
“Why? What do you hope to accomplish by going there?”
“To