Chapter Five
It was hours before Clarissa made herself leave her bed.
The first hour, she could barely move, think, breathe.
The frustration, the humiliation, had been paralyzing, suffocating. She’d tried to escape into oblivion. And to her enormous surprise, she succeeded. It seemed her nervous system had taken all it could, had done the one thing that would spare her real and lasting damage—shut down.
She woke up disoriented, sobbing.
More hours passed while she tried to regain semblance of equilibrium. She’d stood beneath scalding water and tried to let it wash away her confusion and anger—and most of all, the insidious craving Ferruccio had infused in her blood, the memory of those moments when he’d remote-controlled her, driven her to the brink of insanity, before withdrawing and leaving her feeling like she’d never stop falling. The next hour was spent going through the motions of drying her hair and getting dressed—and not in a skirt suit. Then she’d sat down at her computer table and finally let herself think. Let the one thought that now filled her being take the form of words.
She didn’t want to see or hear of Ferruccio ever again.
But she had to.
He’d demanded that she report to his mansion.
And she’d made her decision.
This ended tonight.
She’d tell him where he could stick his demands and terms. She was done being more fuel for his planetary-size ego. If he wanted to to punish her, and appease said ego, she’d assure him, he’d dealt her a blow that should satisfy him for the rest of his unnatural life. Then she would show him why he couldn’t refuse to be Castaldini’s crown prince, what was in it for him. So many things that didn’t include her. She’d persuade him, all right. To leave her out of the bargain and still go ahead with it.
With that fortifying hope powering her, she sprang into action.
The moment she left her apartments, Antonia descended on her like a disapproving mother eagle.
“Clarissa, can you tell me what exactly you’re trying to do here? Signore Selvaggio’s envoys arrived ten hours ago, saying you have an appointment with him!”
“And you didn’t swoop down on me the minute they arrived? That must be the minute hell froze over.”
“I did swoop down, many times. You were dead to the world. In your clothes. I gave up hours ago.”
“Take heart. It must have been that final trial that succeeded in yanking me out of my stupor.”
“What’s wrong with you, Clarissa? You sound…intoxicated.”
Clarissa barked a mirthless laugh. “You know what? I think you’re absolutely right, since intoxication happens when something rises in the blood to the level of toxicity.”
The woman looked as if she’d said the sun was checkered purple and blue. “You’re saying you’ve been consuming alcohol…or something even worse?”
Clarissa smirked. “I’d say arrogance and testosterone are definitely worse.”
Antonia looked to be at a total loss. “I’ve never seen you in this condition, Clarissa. Are you really sick? Or are you just trying to gloss over the fact that you disregarded an appointment with a man of Signore Selvaggio’s importance?”
Clarissa gave her a serene look. “Hey, I’m just fashionably late. That’s a woman’s prerogative, isn’t it?”
The raven-haired, green-eyed battleship of a woman, whom Clarissa loved dearly, dragon ferocity and military discipline and all, tutted. “You’re inexcusably, obscenely late. And you’re not ‘a woman,’ You’re a princess.”
“Believe me, bambinàia, right now I wish I wasn’t either. I’m in this damned situation because of those damned double X chromosomes and that damned accident of birth.”
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